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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27168811">Autumn</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/AliLamba/pseuds/AliLamba'>AliLamba</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Gundam Wing</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst with a Happy Ending, Autumn, Books, Coffee, Eventual Smut, F/M, Flirting, Mutual Pining, Past Relationship(s), Radiator Repair, Sexual Tension, definitely flirting, probably flirting, superintendents, unexpected angst</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-07 01:13:41</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>26,048</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27168811</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/AliLamba/pseuds/AliLamba</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Relena loved her building. It was perfect. Everything was perfect. Her faulty radiator? Not so much.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Relena Peacecraft/Heero Yuy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>63</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>71</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. like a lightbulb in a dark room</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p> </p><p>Relena loved her building.</p><p>Everything about it was so perfect she sometimes thought about it just to make herself feel better. It had an exposed brick exterior with crawling morning glory. Just across the street was a museum she had a membership to, and there was a coffee shop on the corner, next to a Thai restaurant she really liked. Her morning commute was a half block walk to the bus, which dropped her off only three and a half blocks from her work. She was never going to move, maybe.</p><p>Except that maybe, she definitely was.</p><p>She woke up the second day of October with an alarming gasp.</p><p>It was <em>hot</em>.</p><p>Oh my god it was <em>hot</em>.</p><p>She sat straight up in bed, pulling her shirt away from her skin. Something was wrong. Oh no. Something was <em>wrong</em> – her tangled sheets were mostly off the bed as she yanked off her socks, then her flannel pajama pants. It had been a chilly fifty-eight degrees out when she’d gone to bed last night, planning a relaxing Saturday at home and at the park later. This was – what, global warming? Excessively <em>specific</em> global warming?</p><p>She pushed sweaty hair out of her face and stepped up to the radiator by the wall, wincing when it bathed her in its heat waves.</p><p>Oh god. Culprit: identified.</p><p>She went back for her cell phone and grabbed it off its charger as she made for the kitchen, scrolling for the number of the superintendent. Was everyone dealing with this today? She hoped she wouldn’t have to wait too long. Relena paused only to pull open a window, then another, the large ones that overlooked the mechanic behind her building as she walked through the living room. She pressed <em>dial</em> just as she was grabbing for a glass and thrusting it under the kitchen faucet.</p><p>It rang. What time was it? Oh god it didn’t matter.</p><p>The voice that answered was gruff. Low. Unhappy.</p><p>“<em>Hello.</em>”</p><p>Her glass nearly overflowed.</p><p>“Yes, hello? Is this the superintendent?”</p><p>A quiet groan of waking up. She could imagine the person rubbing their face. “Yes.”</p><p>“Yes?” she repeated, shutting off the tap. “What happened to Dr. J?”</p><p>“Died.”</p><p>She nearly choked on the water. </p><p>“He – I’m sorry, he what?”</p><p>A quick sigh. “Died. He’s dead. I’m the new super.”</p><p>Relena absorbed the information as she quickly inhaled, and shook her head a little. Okay. Well. Whatever.</p><p>“It’s – my radiator. I think it’s ninety degrees in here.”</p><p>Another little groan, this time, with some mild amount of frustration. Relena blinked. Um. Hm. She didn’t want to judge too quickly, but, um, she found she was a touch annoyed by his lack of urgency. Wasn’t this his job?</p><p>“Did you try turning it off,” he asked, voice still low, unenthused.</p><p>“Did I – “ Relena stopped, pulled the phone away from her face, looked at the electronic device. “Look, can you just come look at it? This is unbearable.”</p><p>A sigh. “Yeah. Yeah, okay, I’m coming.”</p><p>He hung up, and, Relena – it took a moment for her to take the phone away from her ear, again.</p><p>She did, trying to shake off the feelings of irritation, drinking an entire glass of water instead.</p><p>She tried not to get ahead of herself as she prepared for <em>the new super’s</em> arrival, tidying a bit, putting on her running shorts, putting her dirty hair into a quick bun as she continually frowned at the clock on the wall. He was certainly taking his time. One of her top-four pet peeves was tardiness, and she was sure she’d stressed the urgency of the situation enough. Hmph. Well. He was probably some slovenly, middle-aged whatever, who spent his whole life playing video games in his basement apartment and having no real friends.</p><p>Right. She was also out of coffee.</p><p>Relena looked out a window. The idea of hot tea was still just wholly unappetizing, so Relena took up a post by the door, trying not to glance at her watch. She was being unkind, really. He could be anything. He could have a perfectly legitimate reason to be la—</p><p>Relena sat up straight on the arm of her couch. </p><p>Wait. She didn’t – he didn’t know who she was, which apartment she was i—</p><p>There was a knock on her door.</p><p>Relena was frowning when she went to answer it, unsure if it was the new super or some very early-rising axe murderer; unsure how comfortable she was with the fact that if it <em>was</em> the super then he maybe knew who she was by voice alone? That didn’t seem right.</p><p>She checked the peep hole.</p><p>A young man stood in the hallway, one hand braced against the wall just outside her door. His head was bowed, slightly, so all she saw was a mound of shaggy, unkempt brown hair. Hm. Well – he had a tool belt on, and, there was a box of something at his feet, so –</p><p>“Can you open the door already?” he said, and Relena jumped. “I can see your feet. It’s too early for this.”</p><p>Relena scrambled for the knob, twisting it, pulling the door open.</p><p>The super was maybe – okay. Hm.</p><p>He was slightly taller than her, which was, well, she was above-average herself, and he had these very striking blue eyes that were most certainly annoyed with her already. And he wasn’t slovenly at all. Quite the opposite, actually. As he walked past her in his t-shirt and jeans, she could tell quite immediately that he exercised regularly and did not appear to skip arm day.</p><p>“Are they all busted?”</p><p>Relena closed the door behind him, and followed him into the main living area.</p><p>“I’m sorry?” she asked, distracted.</p><p>“The radiators. You have two. Are they both busted, or not?”</p><p>“Oh,” Relena swallowed. “Yes, I think they’re both broken. I noticed the one in my bedroom first.”</p><p>The super nodded. “Hm,” he grunted, crossing quickly to her bedroom. Well, it was just the one extra door, so, of course he knew where her bathroom was and wasn’t going to that door, was going to the right one because of course he knew the layouts of all these places –</p><p>“<em>Jeezus, shit</em>,” he swore, getting a blast of the sauna that was formerly her bedroom. <em>Ah </em>- crap, she’d forgotten to open those windows.</p><p>“Right, sorry,” she was saying, jumping past him through the doorway so she could fling up the windows. She was pretty sure she started sweating again immediately.</p><p>She turned back to see him as he was wiping his forehead.</p><p>“Well at least you weren’t kidding,” he grumbled, crouching by the radiator.</p><p>Relena’s shoulders dropped, for some reason, and she took up a perch on her bed.</p><p>With Dr. J she hadn’t really done much, just sort of hung out in the next room while he worked on the window that wouldn’t open, and pulled up the carpet tack that had been left behind after the previous renovation, then repaired the hardwood floors.</p><p>Now for some reason she was – she felt as if she should supervise? Hm. Maybe that was ageist of her. It’s just, well he was new after all, and – </p><p>“This might take awhile.”</p><p>Relena started. “Okay.”</p><p>The new super blew out a breath and pulled his tool kit over, flipping it open. Feeling a bit uncomfortable, Relena glanced around the room, ensured everything was in its place, and padded out.</p><p>She picked up a book, the very same one she’d meant to bring to the park with her later, and sat down to try to read. It would be rude to watch over his shoulder, surely. He had gotten the job; he couldn’t be completely inept, Dr. J’s apparent death or no. She found she was staring off into space more than anything, half-listening to the random bangs and hisses of whatever was happening next to her bed.</p><p>After a particularly loud <em>clang</em>, Relena put the book down.</p><p>“Would you like some water?” she called out, about to get a glass for herself.</p><p>There was no reply, so Relena unfolded her legs and walked toward her bedroom. “Would you like some water?” she asked again.</p><p>Or, she’s fairly certain she asked it again.</p><p>To be fair it was entirely possible not all of the words came out right.</p><p>The new super was still working. </p><p>And he had taken off his shirt.</p><p>The room was still hot as hell, so he’d developed a fine sheen of sweat all across his torso as he laid face up on the ground beneath her radiator. And – well – she’s not sure there was a day of exercise he missed, <em>period</em>. His torso appeared to be almost entirely muscle, from the deeply chiseled abs, to the finely sculpted arms and pecs, to the broad back muscles supporting his shoulders. A rower? Maybe he rowed. Rowers rowed boats. On like, water.</p><p>Boats on water.</p><p>He was still wearing the jeans, but they hung low across his hips. </p><p>Relena’s mouth felt dry. Probably it was just the heat. Probably it was a lot of things.</p><p>The superintendent was still working, some sort of tool in one hand, a collection of others laid out within easy reach. When he noticed her, with a quick glance in her direction, Relena jolted back to life.</p><p>“I’m sorry what?”</p><p>He was wrenching something back into place. “Didn’t say anything. You came in here.”</p><p>“Ah. Yes. Right. Well.” She had no idea why she’d come in there. “Ah! Water? Would you like some water?”</p><p>He half-grimaced as he pushed the tool particularly hard. </p><p>“Sure.”</p><p>Relena turned quickly and walked away, noticing as she did that her heart was vaguely racing. Hm. Goodness. She’d – she’d seen naked men before, surely? And this man wasn’t even naked? It was likely just proximity to her bed, was all. He’d had one foot underneath it, long and stretched out like he was, so. Anyway, it was probably that. She filled two glasses with tap water and brought one back to him.</p><p>“How’s it looking,” she prompted, putting the glass by his tools.</p><p>He stopped what he was doing and sighed, short, sitting up all at once. Relena willed her gaze to remain on his face.</p><p>“I might need a part.”</p><p>“A part?”</p><p>The super nodded, rubbing the back of his wrist against his hairline. “Yeah. I don’t think I have what I need downstairs.”</p><p>This was processing a bit slowly in Relena’s mind. But she was catching up.</p><p>“Wait, you think you need a part?”</p><p>“That’s what I said.”</p><p>“But that’s – well, how long is that going to take?”</p><p>The super shrugged one shoulder, picking up the glass of water. “Store opens at ten.”</p><p>“At – at ten! But, that’s hours from now!”</p><p>He was still drinking the water. It was nearly gone. He finished chugging it and put down the glass with an appeased sound. “You got a bathing suit?”</p><p>It took a quick moment to realize he was making a joke. Making...a joke? Was that a joke?</p><p>“I just…I had plans today.”</p><p>He was looking back at the radiator. “Yeah, so did I.”</p><p>She frowned again. This, well, it <em>was</em> his job.</p><p>“I can be back around eleven,” she offered, reorganizing things in her head.</p><p>“Fine,” he said, standing only after grabbing his shirt off the ground, using it to wipe the back of his neck. She did <em>not</em> pay attention to what it did to his back and arm muscles, as he did so.</p><p>She followed as he made his way out, noticing that he was looking around on this return trip. She’d lived in her apartment almost six months, now, and it was, well, finally decorated to some satisfaction. Then she noticed that his feet were…slowing, somewhat, the closer they got to the front door.</p><p>He paused right before opening the door. There was a short, cramped hallway there, with the door that opened to her bathroom.</p><p>“Thanks for…the water,” he said, turning and thrusting the empty glass in her direction.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>She was hoping that her day wasn’t wasted, so she flipped her schedule; went to the park to do her reading first, stopping at the coffee shop as she did, splurging on a flavored latte, waiting until she’d felt the true bite of autumn before she even attempted a sip.</p><p>The bad thing was that the book was no good. She found herself getting distracted halfway down every page, staring instead at the people’s comings and goings.</p><p>She should date more. That’s what she was thinking.</p><p>There was nothing <em>interesting</em> about her apparently very attractive superintendent. He was handy with tools, that was all, and maybe he rowed. Surely not the beginnings of some sort of love story, or even –</p><p>Well. She was getting ahead of herself. She closed the book with a sigh, and checked her phone. No messages, and it was nearly eleven already. Hmph. See? Top-four pet peeves: tardiness. He might have an attractive body but it would honestly never work.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>She steeled herself to open the door, taking off her coat before she’d even taken the keys back out of the lock. <em>Damnit,</em> it was hot. She was going to call him. Half an hour leisurely walk back home and he hadn’t called the whole way. God, it was hot! Even with the windows open. She pulled off her shoes, her socks, her sweater, unbuttoned her pants and started peeling them over her hips. If she was going to have to wait she was going to do it in comf—</p><p>“Holy sh—!”</p><p>She’d never come so close to swearing before.</p><p>“I got the part.”</p><p>Relena put a hand against her heart, leaning back against the nearest wall. The super had <em>let himself in to her apartment, </em>apparently, and was already hard at work.</p><p>It had quite clearly stopped her heart. Stopped it, then restarted it, at triple the speed.</p><p>“I was under the impression you were supposed to call first,” she said, frustrated, annoyed, recovering from sheer terror.</p><p>“We had an appointment,” he was saying, using a wrench. “Eleven, remember? You’re late.”</p><p>“I’m – “ she put the hand on her face. Her hands were still cold; it felt good. She should sit down. She felt light-headed. Christ. “I was waiting on a call.”</p><p>He shrugged. “So I’ll call next time.”</p><p>She wanted to raise her eyebrows. <em>Next time?</em> Ugh. Please let there be no next time. The super glanced at her again. And then his gaze darted to her hips.</p><p>They didn’t – they didn’t <em>linger</em> – but –</p><p>Oh dear god.</p><p>Relena grabbed her pants, and yanked them forcefully up her hips.</p><p>“Right,” she said, completely unsure what to do with her life. Was this where she died? Please let this be where she died. “Okay. Right. You were supposed to call. Pretty sure that’s in my tenants bill of rights. Pretty sure that’s a law.”</p><p>He didn’t respond. Just grunted his way through more manual labor while she contemplated disappearing into the ground. She went to her kitchen instead, using the screening of an extra wall to lean against the kitchen counter, hidden, while she put her head in her hands.</p><p>Okay? Okay. Not a great first day with the new super.</p><p>Not a great day in general.</p><p>“You got somewhere to stay if I can’t get this fixed?”</p><p>She dropped her hands. “You can’t get it fixed?”</p><p>“I didn’t say that.”</p><p>She paused, counting her breaths.</p><p>“Yeah,” she said. “But, please get it fixed!”</p><p>Preferably in the next ten seconds. She could live in her kitchen for an hour, maybe two, but after that she’d get tired of standing. Agh, her phone was in the room where the super was. Maybe she could hold out three hours, but, not without her phone.</p><p>She ensured her pants were buttoned and zipped, then stepped back into her living room.</p><p>The super had taken off his shirt again.</p><p>When he saw her, he smirked, a little.</p><p>“Seemed only fair,” he said, and Relena nearly rolled her eyes.</p><p>“Har, har,” she said, stomach tightly clenched and nerves alight as she crossed to her purse and fished out her phone and her book. She started walking past him, avoiding eye contact.</p><p>“I’ll be in my bedroom. Let me know when you’re ready to switch.”</p><p>He didn’t answer her, which she took as acknowledgement, and she shut her bedroom door with a small <em>click</em>.</p><p>The next forty minutes passed mostly uneventfully. The super continued his work as Relena continued to read. She’d thankfully reached an interesting part, so she was fully engrossed when the super started walking in and out of her room, to fix the radiator there instead. She barely looked up until he was done, his tools collected, and shrugging his shirt back on.</p><p>“Okay,” he said, and Relena put down her book.</p><p>“Okay?” she asked, momentarily confused. She caught up quick. “Okay!” she said, scrambling out of bed. She hopped to the radiator, flashing her hands over the top, releasing a relieved sigh when only a tepid warmth emanated.</p><p>“Thank goodness,” she breathed. She looked over her shoulder at him.</p><p>He was nodding, tightly, tool kit in one hand.</p><p>“Seriously, thank you.”</p><p>“It’s, what I’m supposed to do.”</p><p>She held in the grimacing sort of smile she wanted to make, because, well, she hadn’t had every confidence.</p><p>She walked him out to the door again, for no good reason besides manners. “Did the whole building have this problem? Will you be at it all day?” she asked, for conversation. The walk felt long, for some reason.</p><p>“Nope,” he answered.</p><p>Relena pressed her lips together when he didn’t say more. Right. Job over. She got to the door first, and opened it for him.</p><p>“Seriously, though, thank you. I’d uh,” why was she still trying to make nice? Did she really feel so guilty? “I’d already packed up my bathing suits, so.”</p><p>He paused, right outside the door, and a small smirk touched the side of his mouth.</p><p>He took the stairs down.</p><p>Relena watched him go. She walked back into her apartment, pausing only to bathe in the relative cool of her lovely living room. And it wasn’t even too late; she could still go for a run with her neighbor if Catherine was up for it. And after her morning, she <em>really</em> felt like going for a run. Yes, run, and grocery shopping, maybe watch a movie, early night. Not bad for a Saturday evening in her late 20’s.</p><p>She went to her phone, pulling up the texting feature. She was about to scroll for the last message she’d sent to Catherine in 4D, but…</p><p>She bit the inside of her cheek, frowning.</p><p>Hm.</p><p>Well.</p><p>It couldn’t – well, it would be appropriate –</p><p>She typed in the name before she could stop herself. <em>Superintendent</em>.</p><p>Her thumbs flew over the keyboard.</p><p>
  <em>[Right. You’ve fixed my radiator and seen my underwear, and, I don’t know your name.]</em>
</p><p>What was she doing? She found she couldn’t sit still. She paced her apartment, wondering when he would see the message, wondering whether he would bother responding at all. He’d struck her as prickly, to put it best, and, she was by no means the only tenant in the building. She was just putting together a very late lunch at the kitchen counter, when her phone lit up next.</p><p>
  <em>[Heero.]</em>
</p><p>It took her a moment to realize he was telling her his name. <em>Heero</em>. Okay, that was fine, just information to log away. She could change the profile in her phone, surely, and she wouldn’t be assuming Dr. J would answer the next time she called. She was just finishing the last of her half-sandwich, when her phone lit up again.</p><p>
  <em>[And, the underwear was cute.]</em>
</p><p> </p><p>It honestly didn’t occur to her until she was mid-run, two hours later, that he could have been flirting with her.</p><p>She nearly tripped over the pavement.</p><p>“You okay?” Catherine was asking, short red hair bouncing.</p><p>“Yeah,” Relena said, breathless, as she took an extra quick step to catch up. They had a regular route along the waterfront, and they were just past halfway. “Yeah,” she continued, swallowing. She was only slightly out of breath. “Hey, d’you know our new super?”</p><p>Catherine broke out into a grin.</p><p>“Maybe,” she answered. Catherine was at about the same running level; her breathing was also labored  </p><p>“Maybe!” Relena said, mildly horrified by the implication. Catherine had what they both called a ‘very healthy personal life,’ which contrasted well to Relena’s love of books and sporadic afternoon dates every few months. Catherine was laughing, eyes facing forward.</p><p>“No, not like that. I’ve just, seen him around. I know he’s been uh,” she paused, panting, cutting a glance to gauge Relena’s understanding, “<em>fixing</em> a lot, though.”</p><p>Relena balked as her gait finally steadied. “You can’t be serious.”</p><p>Catherine laughed again. “Don’t tell me your radiator broke!”</p><p>Now Relena was frowning, as they took a bend in the trail. “Wait,” Relena said, still panting lightly between words. “It did actually. He fixed it this morning.”</p><p>Catherine had to stop running. She held out a hand, bending at the waist, pitched forward so she could laugh in greater comfort.</p><p>Relena jogged back to her friend, slowing to a stop, catching her breath.</p><p>“How do you know this?” she asked the redhead, when Catherine was nearly back together again, but wiping gingerly at her eyes. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.</p><p>“Sorry, it’s not that funny.” Deep breath. “My neighbor, 4C. She gave me the head’s up that, he, well.” Catherine let loose a grin. “Just call and say your radiator’s bust. For a good time,” she added a wink. “Pretty sure he’d say no if he didn’t want to, but, you know, 4C’s a total fox, so. I wouldn’t say no. 4<em>E </em>on the other hand – ”</p><p>“But you haven’t – “</p><p>Catherine’s eyes gleamed. She was still breathing hard. “No. Not yet, anyway. I’ve been thinking about it, if my apps ever start letting me down. Have you seen that guy? Have you seen his <em>arms? </em>Jeez. Probably not a great idea to shit where you eat though, you know what I mean?”</p><p>Relena frowned. She did, but – her heartrate was still elevated – was Catherine right?</p><p>“Seriously, ‘Lena, I heard them going at it two nights ago. He seems like he can keep up, if that’s any consolation.”</p><p>It wasn’t, but, none of this was making her feel better. Goodness, she was really going to have to evaluate her prejudices, not to mention her ability to read people. Things about that morning started to make sense, then. <em>At least you weren’t kidding.</em> That had seemed odd. His reluctance to help, that maybe – well. Relena shook off the thoughts. What was she doing? It didn’t matter. None of this mattered. She wasn’t exactly looking for a boyfriend. And certainly she wasn’t going to start looking for a boyfriend like <em>this.</em></p><p>“Well, he does in fact know how to fix a radiator,” she said, and she took off down the path before Catherine could get another laughing word in.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Sunday morning she woke blessedly cool, and she’d bought coffee the day before, so she had a very pleasant end of weekend reading, doing laundry, and going for lunch and the library with Lucrezia, who tolerated her languorous browsing better than anyone else she knew.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>It was a busy week at work and she had, well, other things on her mind, so it wasn’t until the next weekend that Relena remembered she had a very hot superintendent.</p><p>She was sitting in the coffee shop, in the chair by the window so she could look at the light, drizzly afternoon rain, and read for a few hours with a large cup of tea. It might’ve been sad except that it was so remarkably pleasant.</p><p>She didn’t notice the first time he jogged past the window.</p><p>Nor the second time.</p><p>The third time, she only noticed, because he paused. He paused, and, walked right up to the window, cupping his hands so he could see inside, looking directly at her. And this she only noticed because he added a quick <em>bang</em> against the glass.</p><p>Relena jumped in her chair.</p><p>Her eyes rounded when she saw who it was, and who was looking directly at her.</p><p>“Heero?” she asked anyway, because he was frowning at her. When she didn’t immediately move he jerked his thumb toward the door.</p><p>Relena scrambled to a stand, forgetting her tea, reflexively keeping a finger in the book as she closed it. She walked briskly to the door and opened it, stepping out when she noticed the chill in the wind.</p><p>Heero was drenched through with sweat. His hair, his shirt, all down his legs. Maybe it was the rain? But he’d clearly been out for a run. Which was dangerous; it was so easy to slip, and twist an ankle, really not advisable –</p><p>“Hey. You’re 3B.”</p><p>“Relena, yes.”</p><p>“I know your name.”</p><p>She swallowed. “Right. Can I help you?”</p><p>“Yeah,” he said, panting a little. “I need to get back into the building.”</p><p>She knew her expression had slackened, somewhat. “The…building,” she echoed, not quite understanding.</p><p>“Yeah. Left my fucking keys inside.”</p><p>“But – “ she started, frowning. “But there’s a code? Surely there’s a code.”</p><p>He stared at her. The rain was still falling in thin, delicate sheets with the wind, beyond the awning. Oh.</p><p>“You’ve forgotten the code.”</p><p>“I have other things on my mind.”</p><p>She felt the sudden urge to tease him, then, but a glance at his expression told her it wasn’t the best idea. She took a breath. “Right, yes, let me just get my coat.”</p><p>“You don’t have to walk me. I’ll just bring them back after I get inside.”</p><p>“Oh,” she said. She <em>was</em> in a particularly good part of her book. “Well. Yes. Okay, that would work.”</p><p>She walked back to her seat, catching and then dropping the interested stares of the other regular patrons, knowing she had broken some of the unofficial social code of Saturday afternoon café-dwellers. <em>Glasses</em> was openly staring. <em>Blue coat</em> was hiding behind his laptop, looking rather annoyed, putting on an exaggerated shiver as she passed to let her know she’d left the door open too long.</p><p>Relena went back to her spot, and, found it occupied.</p><p>A woman was on her cell phone, mid-conversation, half a dozen shopping bags at her feet. They were all dripping water, and, Relena worked very hard to school her expression into contrite apology as she got her coat from behind the woman’s back (she was sitting on it), picked up her purse from between the chair and the window (the woman smiled tightly and went back to talking), and bussed her nearly empty teacup (the woman mouthed <em>thank you</em> and picked up her own cup instead).</p><p>Relena didn’t meet Heero’s gaze when she walked back out to meet him, shrugging on her coat, brushing her sheet of hair from beneath the collar.</p><p>Heero was looking past her, glaring inside.</p><p>“You could’ve just told her to move,” he said, gruff.</p><p>Relena didn’t even feel like turning around. “It’s fine,” she said. “I was about to leave anyway.”</p><p>Heero’s frown deepened, but he said nothing, especially as she started walking back toward their building and he fell in step with her.</p><p>The rain was so light and her building so close she hadn’t brought an umbrella, which hadn’t bothered her until now.</p><p>“Thanks, for, this,” he said, after a moment. Relena tilted her head in his direction.</p><p>“It’s no trouble. You’re new, yes?”</p><p>He nodded, half-distracted. “My last building didn’t have so few tenants. I tried waiting for someone to come out but. And then I tried calling someone to let me in but no one except 4C answered and Elaine’s pissed at me and.” He stopped himself short, all but glowering. “Nevermind. Just, thanks.”</p><p>That information settled, somewhere, in the back of her mind. <em>Elaine</em>. </p><p>She tried not to think about it.</p><p>They got to their building quickly, and Relena used her keys to open the front door.</p><p>“Thanks,” Heero said, jogging to the stairs that led down to the basement, when he suddenly stopped, halfway across the foyer. Stopped, and, leaned back on his heels, bringing a hand to his head. “<em>Shit,” </em>he muttered, and Relena paused on her way to the stairs that went up.</p><p>“You’ve just realized you don’t have keys to your apartment, either, haven’t you.”</p><p>Heero looked at her from the corner of his eye, and nodded.</p><p>“Unsure that I can help you there.”</p><p>Heero’s lips twisted, while he frowned, thinking.</p><p>“Pretty sure I can pick the lock. Can I check your apartment for something I can use?”</p><p>Relena’s eyebrows raised. Well. Hm. Okay. She didn’t want to think about the fact that her superintendent both had a key and also could pick locks without them, but, there they were.</p><p>“Sure,” she found herself answering, and they walked up the stairs together.</p><p>She’d never appreciated more that she cleaned her apartment on Saturday mornings as a habit, than when she was about to let Heero into it on an unexpected Saturday afternoon.</p><p>They walked in together, Heero closing the door as she slid off her coat. He took off his shoes, which was polite, but then took off his socks, too, when he realized how wet they were.</p><p>“Not sure what you’re looking for,” she said, hanging her purse on the hook next to her coat.</p><p>“I’ll know it when I see it.”</p><p>Relena hummed acknowledgement, going to the kitchen for lack of something else to do. She put the kettle on for much the same reason. “Junk drawer’s by the – “</p><p>“I found it.”</p><p>Relena’s gaze cast upwards, as she debated how she felt about the fact that he had no qualms rummaging through her stuff so readily. She thought about offering him some tea, but, selfishly hoped he wouldn’t be staying that long. She stared instead at the kettle, listening to him sift through her belongings.</p><p>“Were you superintendent at your last place?” she asked, right before Heero came walking into the kitchen.</p><p>He was using the lower hem of his shirt to wipe off his face and neck, which – she – well – she just wasn’t prepared for it, was all. He went to the first drawer that appealed to him, apparently, sliding it open and looking inside.</p><p>Relena realized her mouth was open a little, and closed it.</p><p>“No,” Heero said, answering her question while glaring at her kitchen supplies. She thought he might elaborate, but, he did not.</p><p>“Was your last place around here?”</p><p>“No,” he said again, opening a different drawer. Her correspondence supplies. She liked writing letters. When he sighed, closing the drawer, he continued. “I’m at MIT. Moved from out of state. Started last month, housing fell through. This turned up.”</p><p>“MIT?”</p><p>He nodded, glancing around her kitchen, going to her knife block and pulling the knives out one by one to examine their blades. “Computers. It’s what I was doing before. There was a job I wanted and my boss blocked the promotion, said not without an advanced degree. Pretty sure he thought I wouldn’t do it.”</p><p>Relena was peering at him, trying to amalgamate information. Huh.</p><p>“Wait. You started a graduate degree at MIT – in computer science – out of, what, spite?”</p><p>The corner of Heero’s lips curved into a grin as he turned away from the knives. “Something like that.”</p><p>Her kettle started to whistle.</p><p>“Maybe I could help if I knew what sort of thing you were looking for,” she offered, switching off the burner. Heero was between her and the mugs, so she didn’t immediately go for them.</p><p>He put his hands on his hips, frowning again. “Something sharp and small,” he said. “Like a skewer maybe, but metal.”</p><p>“Like a bobby pin?”</p><p>“What are those.”</p><p>She thought about it for a second, then, reached up and pulled one out of her hair. The piece she’d pinned in place fell down, into her face. “Like this,” she said, brushing the hair away. She handed it over.</p><p>Heero frowned, considering it. He seemed to frown a lot. “Looks breakable. Possibly not long enough. But it’s better than what I found already.” He handed it back. “Bathroom?”</p><p>She nodded, but, he was already walking out of her kitchen. “Yeah,” she added, anyway. She worked through the warmth spreading through her ribcage because he’d touched her fingers in passing, going to the cabinet, picking out a mug and a teabag, adding the hot water. Ignore it. Forget it. It didn’t matter. She held the mug in both hands as she wandered back into the main room, crossing to the bathroom. She stopped in the door and found Heero, crouched beside her clawfoot tub, peering into her below-sink cabinet. He’d been pushing things around, including (to her horror), her menstrual supplies and spare box of condoms, but, he looked completely nonplussed about it.</p><p>Well. Hm. Okay? Okay then.</p><p>“Medicine cabinet,” she supplied, bringing the too-hot tea to her face, letting its steam hide her caged expression.</p><p>Heero stood on strong legs and flipped it open. It was thankfully sparse, nothing too embarrassing besides spot cream, which, she certainly wasn’t going to feel anything about. He found her small collection of bobby pins and pulled out a few.</p><p>“Is it okay if all of these don’t survive?”</p><p>Relena nodded.</p><p>Heero closed the cabinets.</p><p>“MIT is a hard program,” she said, unsure why she was dragging out their interaction. He’d just been touching her box of tampons, for crying out loud. Nosiness, probably. People sometimes told her she was nosy. “I’m sure there are others that would’ve been closer to home.”</p><p>He smirked at her then. Smirked in a way that let her know he read right through her softball probe for sensitive information. He took a few steps in her direction and paused.</p><p>“Wanted a change of scenery.”</p><p>“Is this a big change?”</p><p>“From Washington state?” he answered, shrugging. “Sure.”</p><p>She took a sip of tea. Why was she asking so many questions? Why was he letting her ask so many questions? “Washington state is a long ways away.”</p><p>He leaned against the wall, crossing arms and legs.</p><p>“Like I said,” he continued. “I wanted a change of scenery.”</p><p>She shouldn’t be asking these questions at all. None of it mattered. It’s not like she wanted anything to do with him, really, even though his shirt was sticking to his skin still, even though his jersey running shorts were doing marvelous things for his backside.</p><p><em>For a good time</em>, Catherine had said.</p><p>She couldn’t think of a reasonable thing to ask that would have him divulging more information, but, she also couldn’t quite decide why she wanted it. Relena wasn’t a casual sex sort of person. She’d had all of one single one-night stand, way back in college, but every other encounter had been part of a short- to medium-term bout of monogamy. She didn’t have anything <em>against</em> casual sex, per se, she’d just...never understood the appeal, really.</p><p>“I have to go,” Heero was saying, and Relena felt her face warm. Her train of thought was pretty ridiculous. Heero pushed off her bathroom wall, and she kept the mug close again as she leaned back, so he could walk through the door around her. It was close confines, made closer by her bizarre reluctance to move, made closer by Heero’s larger frame.</p><p>And – her stomach churned – he actually paused, right when he was moving past her. Paused and looked down at her, and Relena held her mug tight.</p><p>“You’re almost out of condoms, by the way.”</p><p>Her cheeks were <em>aflame</em>. Somehow (<em>panic, probably, definitely panic</em>), she held his stare.</p><p>“Pretty sure I have all the ones I need.”</p><p>Heero looked at her face, then. He looked and looked at it, and then finally, he smirked. And then he left without a backward glance.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>She saw him once or twice over the course of the next week without any real reason to talk to him, once at the mailboxes (he wore glasses sometimes, apparently, maybe to class?), and another time while they were both in line at the neighborhood grocery store and she resisted the urge to check out what was in his basket.</p><p> </p><p> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. like a flower waiting to bloom</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>i think i'm just going to change the description of this fic to "four times Relena's radiator breaks and the one time she does it on purpose" and i'm just not sorry about that</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p> </p><p>It was a Wednesday that really ought to be a Friday, going by stress-levels-at-work standards, so she stopped at the Thai place on her way home and got take-out. It smelled amazing the whole quick walk back home, and she was <em>hungry</em>, getting back too late to begin with, having not eaten since her early desk lunch.</p><p>And she opened her front door and –</p><p>Oh no.</p><p>It’s – no!</p><p>Relena groaned, wincing to avoid crying because her day was already trash and now it was…trash on trash. She held her mail in her teeth as she dumped the food in the kitchen and then <em>ripped</em> off her coat, rolling up the sleeves of her button-up work shirt as she pulled out her phone and dialed the super again.</p><p>“Yeah,” Heero answered, and she couldn’t add <em>annoyed by his lack of good manners</em> to her list of things because it was already full.</p><p>“Heero, it’s Relena. 3B.”</p><p>“I know who it is.”</p><p><em>Right.</em> “It’s hot again.”</p><p>There was a quick pause. “Hot as in – “</p><p>“You said you fixed it.”</p><p>“I did fix it.”</p><p>“Clearly not!” she said, her temper slipping the leash. She took a quick breath. “Sorry, that was – <em>sorry.</em> It’s been the worst week. Can you come and take a look? Do you have time?”</p><p>Another small beat. “Yeah I’m on my way.” It did sound as if he was grabbing his tool kit. She released a breath.</p><p>“Thank you,” she said, and Heero made his acknowledgment sound before hanging up.</p><p>Relena looked around her apartment, and found that she’d been less than diligent about keeping it clean. She took one last longing look at her dinner, and elected to tidy instead. She put out a fresh towel, wiped down the surfaces in the bathroom (as if he was going to be going in there, ugh stop it), freshened up the throw pillows, was just collecting her scattered piles of books when there was a knock on the door.</p><p>She straightened, sighed in resignation, and walked to open it, kicking off her heels as she went.</p><p>“Thanks for coming so fast,” she said, walking instead to the windows to open them for everyone’s comfort. Oh her poor plants. She’d nearly forgotten them. They were not meant for tropical climates.</p><p>“No problem,” Heero was saying, closing the door behind himself as he walked through with familiarity.</p><p>He set himself up in front of the radiator in her living room, and Relena went to her kitchen for the bottle of wine she’d been working through over the last week. She poured herself a healthy glass, then leaned in the doorway of her kitchen to take the first sip.</p><p>Heero was crouched in front of the radiator, tool box open. He was wearing a t-shirt and jeans again (no glasses this time, maybe he was near-sighted? Maybe he wore contacts. <em>Maybe it didn’t matter</em>), which seemed to be a favorite ensemble. She took a sip so she wouldn’t sigh. Honestly, she needed a date.</p><p>She caught a whiff of her dinner.</p><p>“Do you mind if I eat?” she asked, decorum forfeited.</p><p>Heero shook his head without turning around. “Nope.”</p><p>Relena set down her wine and pulled out a fork instead, grabbing the first carton and opening it, inhaling the smell of lemon grass, garlic, fish sauce, chicken and vegetables. It was the best thing she’d ever smelled, maybe. She took a few quick bites right there over the counter, then, after alternating a sip of the wine, she made her way back to where Heero was sitting.</p><p>“How does it look,” she asked, mostly to be polite.</p><p>Heero let out a breath.</p><p>“This shouldn’t be happening.”</p><p>Relena took another bite, chewing as Heero loosened something with a wrench. She shouldn’t – she’d been told she was too nosy – She swallowed.</p><p>“I got a book.”</p><p>Heero paused what he was doing, and looked up at her. “You got a book.”</p><p>She nodded. “Yeah. <em>Radiator Repair for Beginners</em>. There’s a whole section on this model.”</p><p>She didn’t know Heero well, but, she could’ve sworn something like <em>amusement</em> warmed his gaze. She gestured with her fork.</p><p>“In two-pipe steam installations, steam flows from the boiler to the radiators through an inlet pipe. Once the steam condenses—“</p><p>“—it returns to the boiler through a second outlet pipe.”</p><p>Relena held his stare, and Heero smirked.</p><p>“I got the same book.”</p><p>Relena leaned back, taking a chair instead. Heero’s brows creased a bit as she crossed her legs, but damn if she was going to change out of her work clothes before getting a proper meal in. He’d known she had a job, yes? She liked the feel of her stockinged toes on the hardwood, anyway. The skirt she could do without, but, priorities.</p><p>She looked around her apartment. “I’m sure it’s here somewhere if you want a reference.”</p><p>Heero turned back toward the radiator. “It’s fine.”</p><p>She took another bite, debating whether to press. She hadn’t done much more than skim, really, for no real reason besides the fact that it was on display at the library and she’d just – well – it just – maybe it seemed like a good idea, at the time, or something.</p><p>She ate for a moment in silence as Heero worked, changing his stance, his tool, his focus for whatever reason suited the job. Sweat was starting to form at the back of her neck.</p><p>“Are you hungry?” she asked, standing. “I got extra.”</p><p>“No, thanks,” Heero said, and she nodded as she swallowed her last bite. The rest could be lunch tomorrow. She always ordered too much anyway, in part because when she was hungry, it <em>all</em> sounded good, and rather than decide, she just preferred to have an excess. There was always someone who wanted it, anyway.</p><p>She cleared away the rest of the food, washing her hands, and her fork, and the counters. She sipped from her wine some more, trying not to think about work. She knew what would happen when Heero left: she’d likely be drawn to her messenger bag, where several manuscripts waited, and she’d sit at her dining room table until her eyes glazed over and she nearly fell asleep sitting up.</p><p>Relena grimaced. Not much of a life, really.</p><p>She took up a perch on the couch and tucked her feet up on the cushions instead.</p><p>“Is that how you learned?” she asked, taking another sip of wine. “From <em>Radiator Repair for Beginners?</em>”</p><p>Heero huffed a laugh, using a tool. “Something like that.”</p><p>“Can you do others too now? Sinks? Basic electrical? Toilets?”</p><p>He paused to look over his shoulder, sparing a glance that told her he did not find her attempt at crude humor amusing.</p><p>“It’s part of the job.”</p><p>Relena looked at her wine.</p><p>“How’s school?”</p><p>He turned back to the radiator.</p><p>“Fine.”</p><p>Relena sighed into another sip. What was she doing? She shouldn’t be bothering him. She shouldn’t be trying to engage. It was probably just work avoidance, but, maybe she was...lonely? No, that didn’t make sense. She had friends, she had coworkers. Heero wasn’t remotely close to either of those categories. </p><p>But, he was there, and.</p><p>She unfolded her whole body back onto the couch, crossing her ankles, head resting on a throw pillow. A cool breeze was sweeping through the apartment with the windows open, washing away the heat that had been going on for hours, probably. It had felt like walking right into an oven. She couldn’t figure out how firemen did it, how they just – they wore so many <em>clothes </em>while doing it too.</p><p>God she really didn’t want to work tonight.</p><p>“You read books.”</p><p>Relena tilted her head in Heero’s direction. Had he really just said that? Had he really just asked a question of her? A glance cut in her direction let her know she hadn’t imagined it.</p><p>“I do,” she acknowledged. After a moment of pause to reflect on the strangeness, she added, mostly out of politeness: “Do you?”</p><p>Heero nodded, running his forearm across his hairline. The radiator was still spewing excess heat.</p><p>“For fun?” she probed, because she couldn’t quite picture it.</p><p>He glanced over his shoulder at her again, then his gaze darted to the nearest small stack of books she had on the opposite end table. “I’ve read that one.”</p><p>Relena toed the top paperback, but he shook his head. “Next one down.” She used her toes to move the book so she could read the spine. If she came off as lazy then it was deserved. Gosh she was nearly ready for bed.</p><p>“Is it good?” she asked, craning her neck so she could take another sip of wine. “I haven’t gotten to that one yet.”</p><p>Heero shrugged. “It’s okay. The middle part just sort of drags.” Relena hummed acknowledgment.</p><p>She swallowed the wine, and then…she…she paused.</p><p>It…it felt like a bit of a moment. There was no particular reason. Really none. But she paused nevertheless, as she glanced at the book in a stack by her couch, as she licked her lips while deciding whether to say any more. Should she? She shouldn’t. She really shouldn’t.</p><p>And yet.</p><p>“I read her last book,” Relena said. “It was good.”</p><p>“Still not as good as her first one,” Heero said, and Relena felt herself release a breath.</p><p>Because there it was. There it went. Heero read books. They had honest-to-god common ground, and it took off: they’d read a lot of the same books, it turned out, and soon Relena was finished with her glass of wine and interested in another, and she’d convinced Heero to accept one too, because he fixed the damn radiator again, and it was a terrible Wednesday in October, and his opinion on modern literature occasionally made her laugh, and one or two things she said made him laugh, too. It wasn’t <em>consequential</em>, really. It was just two people talking, because it was Wednesday, and they both had things to do in the morning. Heero probably had to study. She definitely needed to work.</p><p>“I really need to get out of these clothes,” she said, standing with an empty glass of wine. Heero was sitting at her dining table, chair angled so he could sit on it sideways while they talked. He stifled a yawn as he nodded.</p><p>Relena wouldn’t let herself <em>smile</em>, per se, as she stepped into her bedroom and shut the door. She wasn’t about to do a strip-tease, or anything. She was going to get into the same loungewear she wore every night, because it was only Wednesday, and she had work in the morning, and she’d found a platonic level of friendship she was semi-interested in pursuing with her superintendent. If they never spoke again after tonight, that would be fine too. She took off her slim-fitting button-up, and her lilac, lacy bra. Her pencil skirt and stockings came off next. She left the underwear, pulling on clean sweatpants and a sweatshirt that matched, touting the name of her alma mater. It had been a rather appreciated Christmas present from her brother a few years ago.</p><p>Relena opened her bedroom door, and for a moment, she thought that Heero might have left.</p><p>She wasn’t quite prepared for the feeling of disappointment that spiked through her, then. Had she said something?</p><p>Goodness, maybe – oh god maybe she’d imagined all of it. The familiarity, the camaraderie, the, the way he’d looked at her <em>you’re almost out of condoms</em> oh god. Her gaze darted to the tool box he’d left by the hall, but – <em>wait</em> – that was still there. Was he in her bathroom? She looked around again, and then she found him: sitting quite still on her couch, holding on to one of her throw pillows.</p><p>And he was sound asleep.</p><p>A soft sort of smile spread her face then. She considered whether to wake him up. Really, she should. It would be the polite thing to do. She checked the time. When had it got so late?</p><p>But he looked relaxed, sitting there, on her couch. Like he’d just meant to close his eyes for a moment.</p><p>Relena tiptoed around her apartment, shutting off lights, pausing after each one to see whether he’d wake. He didn’t, so she pulled the throw blanket off the armchair, and, draped it over his lap.</p><p>When he still didn’t wake, she stood still for a moment, looking at him. He <em>was</em> handsome, surely. And yes, he liked books, but. She still wasn’t interested. </p><p><em>For a good time</em>. </p><p><em>Elaine.</em> </p><p>On their last run Catherine had told her she’d seen Heero surreptitiously leaving 1E’s apartment when she’d been doing her own two a.m. walk of shame.</p><p>No, she wasn’t interested.</p><p>But, all the same, it seemed to take her a long time to fall asleep that night.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The next morning Relena woke and found a note scribbled by her coffee pot. It was just one word, but.</p><p><em>Thanks</em>.</p><p>Because beside the note, was a small stack of books, and she could tell just by looking at them that they were from Heero’s private library.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>It took her three and a half days to get through them all, and she got to text him throughout.</p><p><em>[This part with the ducks is pretty cringe-worthy], </em>she wrote, and there were immediate ellipses of someone writing back.</p><p>
  <em>[just power through. When he mentions it again you’ll almost cry]</em>
</p><p>She barked a laugh right there on the bus, but, went back to reading. </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>When she went to return the books she’d read, she added some of her own.</p><p>Heero was probably a faster reader than her, because a day and a half later she got them all back, a neat stack on her doorstep. There was another note tucked inside. </p><p><em>You have good taste in candy.</em> he’d written, probably referencing her near-empty bowl. She grinned in spite of herself, propping the door open while she refilled the bowl and pulled out her phone all at once.</p><p><em>[Happy Halloween],</em> she wrote, before hitting send.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The leaves were starting to fall off the trees, and Heero didn’t always like the books she chose.</p><p>
  <em>[I can’t believe you read this.]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[Twice, actually.]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[Twice.]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[Yup.]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[You will need to explain, in greater detail, why.]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[You don’t find his use of incest and allegory intriguing?]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[I could do without at least one of those.]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[Well all right but without the allegory I really don’t think it would’ve won the awards.]</em>
</p><p>
  
</p><p>
  
</p><p>She couldn’t remember the last time she’d left her house without a sweater, but Heero’s picks occasionally surprised her.</p><p>
  <em>[This book is making me believe in relationships again.]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[Thought you’d like it.]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[Did you not like it?]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[I let you read it, didn’t i?]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[Okay. Scratch that. Couple on the bus just started violently making out and I can hear the sucking sounds from halfway back. Romance was never dead. I just don’t ride the same bus, apparently.]</em>
</p><p>
  <em>[Apparently]</em>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>She woke up late three weeks later, having accidentally stayed up too late horizontally reading through the latest thing Heero had sent her, falling asleep mid-word and opening her eyes to find the book face down on the floor.</p><p>She had to skip her morning shower, dumping coffee into a travel mug as she held a granola bar between her teeth, taking the stairs as she held hair out of her face. The next bus was due in two minutes; she’d have to make it.</p><p>She saw them, before she could see the tone of their conversation. Heero (!) – a smirk formed on her face already, she had to take out the granola bar – his latest choice was ridiculous, she’d never let him live it down – and...she blinked because, he was standing next to her neighbor, Chang Wufei. They were idling at the mailboxes, Chang apparently on his way out, already dressed for what appeared to be a business-casual environment, Heero looking like he didn’t have any classes for a few hours, maybe. She didn’t know 3E well, but, he’d gotten more than one piece of her mail, for no good reason.</p><p>It was...it was something about the way they were standing together. She couldn’t see Heero’s face, but. She could see Wufei’s small smirk. She could see the way they were leaned together. Every interaction she’d had with Wufei had been stilted, awkward, formal. She’d never seen him look anything other than <em>pissed</em>, honestly, and, right now he looked downright...well.</p><p>Wufei saw her coming, saw her looking, and dropped the expression. Relena felt the sting of embarrassment, like she was trespassing on a private moment. Right. Okay. Right.</p><p>She glanced at the door instead. It didn’t matter. None of it mattered. She had maybe ninety-eight seconds to catch the bus.</p><p>She saw vaguely as Heero turned to look at what Wufei was looking at, turned and she did not make eye contact. <em>It didn’t matter it doesn’t matter none of it matters keep walking keep walking keep</em>—</p><p>She was just about to pass them. It was still too easy to see them from her peripheral vision. Chang had turned back to the mailboxes, opening his own, making it look as if he’d been doing nothing else the whole time. Heero though—</p><p>She didn’t mean to. She didn’t <em>want </em>to. But right as they were level, right as she was about to skip past, she cut her gaze in his direction, and they made eye contact.</p><p> </p><p>She refused to let her brain interpret the look. Refused and refused and refused and refused, jogging as the bus was early and she was late, waving a hand at Howard, whom she knew by now, who waved back and reopened the doors so Relena could hop on. She took a seat with a huff of breath, pulling her messenger bag onto her lap, righting the coat which had slipped off her shoulder. Her hair was a long, tangled mess but she’d fix it later.</p><p>She <em>knew</em> he had his own social life. She knew it. She’d known it. She wasn’t interested. She wasn’t interested. She wasn’t interested.</p><p>Her hand was resting on her bag. Beneath her palm, just a layer of canvas away, she could make out the spine of the book she’d been up late reading the night before, the one she’d been so eager to complete on her morning commute. But…she just…she just couldn’t, for some reason. She just couldn’t bring herself to pull it out.</p><p>She stared at the trees they drove past instead. The leaves all different colors, some nearly half-barren after a series of particularly blustery afternoons.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>“Miss Relena?”</p><p>Relena glanced up from staring into the middle distance. </p><p>“Yes? Oh. Sorry Dorothy. Did we have a meeting?”</p><p>Dorothy took up a perch on her desk. Despite the fact that they were equals at work, she’d made a habit from day one of referring to Relena with the strangely formal honorific. It had always rankled her, somehow. She always got the feeling Dorothy was <em>teasing</em> her, somehow. But Dorothy’s dad owned the company, so. She got to do what she wanted. </p><p>“No, I just came by to check on you.”</p><p>A nervous feeling started at the nape of her neck. She knew she’d been distracted all day. She checked the clock. Ah. She’d missed lunch, even.</p><p>“Do you have any weekend plans?”</p><p>Relena peered up at her coworker. Weekend plans? <em>No</em>, her mind whispered. <em>You’d planned on spending all weekend reading through whatever Heero gave you next and flirting via text message</em>. She wanted to cringe but she held off. Flirting. Is that what they’d been doing the whole time? Apparently not. Relena thought he might have texted since this morning, when they’d...passed, in the halls. She wasn’t brave enough to check, yet.</p><p>“Nothing specific,” Relena answered, trying for a smile. “Do you have anything fun going on?”</p><p>“But of course,” Dorothy answered, promptly. “I always make sure to have a full social schedule. It’s important to stay active in your own community, Miss Relena. I’m sure you know the value of this.”</p><p>See? Something in there was a jab, she just knew it. She just – she just honestly couldn’t bring herself to care, for the moment. </p><p>“When was the last time you went on a date?”</p><p>Relena startled, a bit, despite herself. Were her thoughts honestly so transparent? Maybe they were.</p><p>“Oh,” she tried to say, fumbling for some sort of non-answer. “A few weeks ago, I think. It didn’t go well. A friend was just telling me about some new app I thought I’d try—“</p><p>“Let me set you up. I know just the person.”</p><p>Relena fought hard to keep the cringe off her face. She had a feeling no friend of Dorothy’s would be someone she’d find interesting. But, well. Maybe she didn’t have great taste.</p><p>“I don’t know…”</p><p>“Come <em>on, </em>Miss Relena. Just let me set you up on <em>one </em>blind date. I promise she’s tame.”</p><p>Relena drew circles on her desk. Just one date? That couldn’t hurt. And it was a woman, too, that was maybe a good change of pace. She’d read once about <em>pansexual</em> and that seemed to suit her fine, but. But it was just. She just –</p><p>“Oh.”</p><p>Relena tilted her face up. “Sorry?”</p><p>Dorothy was looking down at her, expression drawn, gaze soft with actual, genuine pity. The kind reserved for when someone was making a grave mistake they were too dumb to recognize. “There’s someone else, isn’t there.”</p><p>“No,” Relena said too quickly, sitting up straight. “No, really there isn’t.” She picked up the nearest piece of paper and pretended to try to read the words. “I’ve just, I just haven’t had the interest lately, I’m afraid. I guess you could call it a dry spell? I don’t know.”</p><p>“Then this is the perfect opportunity. Honestly Miss Relena I insist. I think you’ll get along splendidly.”</p><p>Relena stared through the piece of paper she was holding, considering Dorothy’s words. A blind date. A blind date? Ugh. Well really. No – really. What could it hurt.</p><p>“Sure,” she said, attempting a smile. “Tell her I’d love to.” </p><p> </p><p>Relena trudged up her stairs a few hours later, not feeling in her best mood. It had been a crummy afternoon, the weather turning to a cold rain, made worse when she’d missed the first bus by moments and had to stand in the cold for another twenty minutes. She’d taken on an extra assignment during the last meeting at work, a surprise to her boss, who handed it over as if impressed Relena was finally showing some initiative.</p><p>Sure. They’d call it that.</p><p>She’d just rounded the corner to her landing when she saw him.</p><p>Heero was at her door, examining the edges of it, having apparently just dropped off another small stack of books. It was a good mix now: some she’d leant, some he wanted her to see. Their system had become less than orderly lately. </p><p>Her shoulders slumped. How could she possibly explain to him that she really didn’t feel like being his book buddy anymore? She still hadn’t read his text from earlier and was proud of herself for avoiding the words while making plans with Lucrezia for a girls’ night in tomorrow. But it was just as well. Her hand went for the flap on her bag, as she fished out the book she’d lost sleep over the night before.</p><p>“Heero. I’m glad to run into you.”</p><p>He jerked a bit when he heard her voice, which surprised her. He didn’t seem the type to be snuck up on.</p><p>She walked the last few feet, holding out the novel with one hand while she searched for her keys with the other. He took it, semi-automatically.</p><p>“You never responded to my message,” he said.</p><p>Relena didn’t look up as she kept looking for her keys. “Busy day at work,” she tried, finally finding her keys and shoving them at the lock. She nearly kicked over the stack of books he’d left. “Actually, I’m not even sure I’ll have time for these any time soon. Are you sure you don’t want to hold on to them for a while? I can let you know when things cool down.”</p><p>He was standing stock-still, in the hall outside her door, not having moved since she’d handed him the book, maybe. She bent when she noticed this, picked up the stack, pulled out the book that was hers, and tried to hand over the rest with one foot propped in her doorway.</p><p>“Seriously Heero,” she said, when he still didn’t move. “Things are really crazy at work right now.”</p><p>He was staring at her face.</p><p>“Can I come inside,” he asked, voice rough.</p><p>What were they? she wanted to ask, to demand, to – well. Were they friends? Friends let friends into their apartments under near every circumstance. Vague...text buddies? Was that even a thing? Whatever it was it seemed like something else. That was a person she didn’t want to run the risk of seeing her dirty dishes.</p><p>Heero slept around. She knew this. She knew that most people in their building knew this. Whether it was 4C or 1E or 3E or the barista down the block or the random guy she’d seen lost coming out of the basement stairwell two weeks ago, it was clear Heero had a healthy sexual appetite and didn’t care who knew it. He was an attractive guy. He was the building’s superintendent. Everyone knew who he was, by now.</p><p>So. Sure, she’d. Well. Okay. She didn’t know what that made her. Something in the back of her mind thought – well. She wasn’t sure what she’d thought.</p><p>“I have a lot of work to do,” she breathed, and since he clearly wasn’t moving, she shoved the books into his hands, and disappeared inside before he’d managed to open his mouth again.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. like the desert waiting for the rain</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This chapter had me working too hard. This was a smut prompt, okay??? A smut prompt.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The weather suited her mood, the next day; streets filled with the misty gray of fog and cold. She didn’t even quite feel like leaving the house, but, she did, because Lucrezia was coming over, and they would need a new bottle of wine and ingredients for dinner. Nothing fancy, but more than salad from a bag, and she could spend an hour or so cooking while waiting for her friend to come over. It felt good. Productive. Domestic? Sure.</p><p>She’d closed her eyes while blinding tapping on Heero’s message, just so the alert would go away. She didn’t really want to see what he said. She really wasn’t interested, anymore. And he was clearly interested in something else (someone else?), so, it didn’t matter. She’d downloaded a new app and had some vague plans to open it up with Lucrezia later, maybe. Ugh. </p><p>Profile building. Modern dating.</p><p>She buzzed Lucrezia up right at the appointed time of meeting, the wine open and breathing, even though Lucrezia always brought a bottle of her own. They were friends, had been friends for a long time, coopted after Lucrezia and Milliardo had started dating in college and he’d brought her home to visit. They’d stayed friends even after Milliardo broke up with her to move across the Atlantic for a job. It was still her one strong point of contention with her brother, which is why she probably invested so much time in her and Lucrezia’s friendship. Another of her top-four pet peeves: people not admitting it when they’re <em> wrong. </em></p><p>“You want yours or mine?” she called from the kitchen.</p><p>“Don’t matter to me,” Lucrezia answered, making herself comfortable. “Jeez you got enough books lying around? I swear they’re multiplying.”</p><p>She wasn’t ready to think about Heero so quickly.</p><p>Relena forced a laugh. Most of the books weren’t hers. Most didn’t belong to the public library, either.</p><p>“I just hit a stride, I guess.”</p><p>Lucrezia hummed acknowledgement, and Relena could hear her picking things up from the next room. She returned from the kitchen, holding two glasses of wine, and found Lucrezia holding up one of Heero’s books.</p><p>It was… She was holding on to it, sort of. She’d read it twice already. She’d like to read it a third. It had been one of the first Heero had leant her and she just – something about the scene with ducks and the dad…</p><p>“That’s a good one,” Relena said, crossing the room to hand over the glass, taking the other side of the couch.</p><p>“Oh yeah?”</p><p>Relena nodded.</p><p>“Can I borrow it? I’ve had <em> nothing </em>going on lately.”</p><p>Relena looked down at her wine. “Um. Sure. Let me just finish with it, and, I’ll bring it by next weekend.”</p><p>Lucrezia read the back cover, then nodded, putting it back down. “So,” she said, sing-song voice as she prepared to take a sip of her wine, “how’s work.”</p><p> </p><p>Relena really liked Lucrezia. She really liked her friends, though she didn’t have many. Quatre and Trowa were carryovers from college and lived across town; Sally, her old boss, kept in touch regularly. Then there was Catherine the neighbor, some boarding school friends she saw once or twice a month, and, she’d spent a few afternoons on Dorothy’s boat (yacht? Felt weird to call it a yacht), meeting some of her more interesting friends. She <em> liked </em> her life. There was nothing about it that wasn’t…nice. And it was just –</p><p>“Relena?”</p><p>Relena looked up, realized she hadn’t been listening to what her friend had been saying.</p><p>“I’m sorry, what?”</p><p>A flash of worry crossed Lucrezia’s face. “You okay?”</p><p>“Um,” she started. “Yes, yeah, oh I’m fine. Just, work’s been rough, is all.” Lucrezia didn’t look convinced. “Did I tell you I downloaded a new app?”</p><p>Lucrezia’s eyes went round. “Like, for dating? You’re <em> dating </em> again?”</p><p>Relena took some mild amount of umbrage with that. “I…I <em> date</em>, okay.”</p><p>“You date like, once, every three months. And I’m pretty sure it’s just to get the people who know you off your back.”</p><p>That was…startlingly accurate, really.</p><p>“Well I downloaded an app,” Relena said, standing to go get another glass of wine.</p><p>Which is precisely when the power went out.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>A glance out her window told her all she needed to know: the whole block was having problems; even the street lights were out. They tried to keep the mood up with banter and jokes as Relena found her small collection of candles. She lit them, setting them on the table because dinner was done. At least the gas to her stove hadn’t gone out too. They set the table because why not set the table, neither had any reason to host dinner parties on a regular basis, pulling out cloth napkins and the flatware from her mother as they started filling out Relena’s new dating profile. It was one of those, women-in-control, kick out gross guys apps, which seemed alright for the moment.</p><p>Lucrezia was far more versed in modern dating techniques than she was, which, was a shame. Relena felt on the verge of trying to reassure her that Milliardo would come around at least twice, which, was twice more than usual. Honestly she tried not to meddle. Of course Lucrezia wasn’t a monk; she hadn’t completely shut herself off from the world in the years it had been since she and Milliardo were close. And yet all the same...she’d never met any of Lucrezia’s partners...</p><p>They were just finishing up dinner, and Relena was reflecting on it, appreciating that following the recipe to an absurd degree of precision had actually paid off, when there was a clunk, and a splutter, and a hiss, from her terrible radiator.</p><p>Oh no.</p><p>Relena froze, hand on her wine.</p><p>Oh <em> no. </em></p><p>And then the damn thing started <em> gushing heat</em>.</p><p>“Whoa now!” Lucrezia called, because she was sitting closer. Oh <em> no! </em></p><p>“I’m sorry, oh god, I’m so sorry,” Relena was saying, standing, crossing to the windows nearest the damn ridiculous thing that she would honestly chuck out the god damn window if she had even modestly more arm strength, probably.</p><p>“It’s this – “ she was struggling with the window, and she’d knocked into something in the relative dark –  “damn thing; I <em> cannot </em> figure out what’s wrong with it! It’s broken twice already, and it’s just –” she made a frustrated sound. “It keeps happening.”</p><p>“Just, call your super,” Lucrezia responded, standing with her wine.</p><p>Relena bit her lip, hoisting up another window. She was letting in a whole wave of cold, but, she knew from experience that – well –</p><p>“It’ll be fine,” she said, tucking hair behind her ear. “It’s just – I’m sure it’ll go back to normal soon.”</p><p>“Is that what it does? It just goes hyperactive sometimes and then stops?”</p><p>Relena didn’t immediately respond.</p><p>“’Lena?”</p><p>“Um, yeah. Sometimes.”</p><p>Lucrezia was pulling a confused face. “Just, call your super already. I can clean up.”</p><p>Relena let go of her lower lip. “There’s dessert above the fridge…” she mumbled, automatically, because, well, there <em> was </em> technically dessert available next. She’d stopped by the local bakery and picked up something that looked nice. </p><p>But mostly, she was trying to weigh the relative merits of calling her superintendent in that moment of time. Could it wait? She didn’t want to call him. Maybe it honestly <em>would </em> go off on its own. She hadn’t been aware the last two times it had <em> started</em>, but, well, but, it was –</p><p>She chewed on her bottom lip, standing between the overheating radiator and the freezing night air coming from outside. She could <em> hear </em> Lucrezia shudder with cold from the next room. If she’d been by herself, in her sweatpants and matching sweatshirt, Relena might…well, yeah, okay, definitely she wouldn’t even be considering it. She wouldn’t even be considering calling Heero until she was on her way out to work Monday morning. But it was too awkward, too humbling, too <em> confusing </em> to explain to her friend. And she just didn’t want to deal with it.</p><p>Relena shook her head, blowing out a breath, and picked up her phone.</p><p>She turned away as she dialed.</p><p>“There’s nothing I can do about the power outage,” he snapped, when it stopped ringing.</p><p>Relena didn’t immediately respond.</p><p>“Hello?” came his gruff response. There was a pause. She knew he was pulling the phone away to see who’d called. Her heart was feeling tight in her chest.</p><p>The sound of his face came back to the earpiece.</p><p>“Relena?”</p><p>“It’s my radiator again.”</p><p>There was another, <em> longer </em> pause on the other side of the line. A pause and then, Heero sucked in a breath.</p><p>“Okay.”</p><p>“I’m serious.”</p><p>“Okay.”</p><p>“It’s doing it again, there’s something wrong with it.”</p><p>“Okay,” he said a third time, this time after just the briefest of pauses, and her heart was beating faster. “I’ll come up.”</p><p>“Bring your—“ she started to say, because, for some reason, for some stupid, ridiculous reason, she wanted to make <em> sure, </em>he knew, that she was serious, that it was <em> just</em>, honestly, her radiator, and – “Nevermind.”</p><p>“I’ll be there in a minute,” he answered. His voice was tender and quiet when he said it, and a warmth she didn’t want spread under her skin.</p><p>Lucrezia appeared in the doorway just after Relena hung up the phone. She’d already found the cake, had already found a fork to start eating it with. “Everything okay?”</p><p>Relena stared at her for a moment, and nodded.</p><p>She let Lucrezia talk as they sat back down at the table, as Lucrezia got Relena a fork, and she tried to focus on eating, rather than what noises could be coming from just outside her door. <em> It didn’t matter</em>, she tried to tell herself. It didn’t matter, it didn’t matter.</p><p>But all the same, when the doorbell rang, she nearly jumped.</p><p>Lucrezia stopped what she was saying mid-chew, and gave Relena a queer look. “You okay?”</p><p>“Yeah,” she answered, scrambling to stand, running a hand through her hair as she went to answer the door. Her heart was beating with annoying speed, and she wished it would just stop already.</p><p>She opened the door, and there he was, just as he should be, just as she should have expected. He was wearing a dark green sweater over his shirt, still in the dark jeans, and he was looking right at her, with some sort of drawn, tight expression.</p><p>There was a beat of just looking, and then, Relena stepped back to let him through.</p><p>“It’s just through there. Same problem, as before. I heard a hiss this time.”</p><p>Heero nodded, his eyes darting past her. He took a few steps inside. </p><p>The candles were still fluttering their light over all the surfaces in her apartment, and it still smelled like dinner and wine.</p><p>And it took but a moment to realize Heero had stopped, just at the entrance to her living room. </p><p>“Hello,” Lucrezia was cooing, and Relena could see over Heero’s shoulder that she was waving with her fork. “Thanks for coming so fast. Hey you’re way younger than my last super.”</p><p>He didn’t respond as Relena closed the door and followed, her chest tight and tangled. She paused right behind his back.</p><p>An awkward tension was spreading through the room, then. Lucrezia eyeing Relena expectantly, Heero standing awfully still. </p><p>Relena said nothing.</p><p>Because Heero was... He was <em> just the superintendent</em>. She didn’t owe him an explanation. She didn’t owe him an introduction. They owed each other nothing, her irregular breathing or no.</p><p>She looked at Lucrezia. “You want to hang out in the bedroom until he’s done?” she asked, and Lucrezia nodded, half-confused but consistently loyal. Relena released half a breath and slid past Heero to grab the bottle of wine from the table.</p><p>Lucrezia brought the cake.</p><p>They settled on Relena’s bed. Her bedroom radiator didn’t seem to be the main culprit, so even though the windows were open in the living room and cool air was spilling in from under the door, they barely had to share Relena’s decorative quilt to stay warm.</p><p>“He was cute,” Lucrezia murmured, licking frosting off her lips. Relena was sprawled across the width of the bed.</p><p>“Not my type,” she answered, too easily, too <em>readily,</em> sipping her wine. It was the beginning of her third glass, and, she was definitely going to have a headache in the morning. Two glasses was usually her limit, two glasses and she wouldn’t operate heavy machinery under any circumstances.</p><p>Lucrezia shrugged, and then held her hand out for Relena’s phone.</p><p>It was something about the nerves. Something about the wine, and the nerves, and the good dinner, and the having him so close while trying so hard to pretend he couldn’t overhear them through her thin walls - Whatever it was, a nervous sort of energy filtered in that Relena couldn’t handle at all. Lucrezia made a bad joke about her dating profile and Relena giggled, she actually <em> giggled </em> (two glass limit, ugh, another top pet peeve: drinking too much), and then most everything they were doing felt stupid and juvenile and ridiculous, as they started joking about the potential matches that popped up, as they started trying out new pick-up lines that most <em> definitely </em> a college-educated person should not be getting away with.</p><p>Half an hour in, there was a tentative knock on her door.</p><p>Relena didn’t hear it at first.</p><p>No, Lucrezia did, standing, balancing her wine as she got off Relena’s bed, as Relena held her own glass up so she wouldn’t spill it everywhere, sprawled on top of her comforter like she was. She would change into her pajama pants after Heero left. Maybe Lucrezia would stay the night. Who needed a whole, giant penthouse apartment like Lucrezia had, when you could share your ex-boyfriend’s little sister’s queen-sized mattress, in the old part of town? With a frequently busted radiator?</p><p>“The radiator’s fixed.”</p><p>Lucrezia looked back over her shoulder to share the good news. “Radiator’s fixed!” she repeated, and Relena held up her glass of wine.</p><p>“Hurrah,” she said, flat.</p><p>Lucrezia made a derisive sound as she turned back around. </p><p>“See? And here I was being totally ageist. You hungry? Relena made a bunch of food. You definitely can’t have any cake but I’d share the roast.”</p><p>“Hey,” Relena whined, propping herself up. “I worked hard on that.”</p><p>“And it shows,” Lucrezia promised, with a wink. “I’m just saying that he looks as if he could use a few more pounds.”</p><p>Heero clearly didn’t enjoy being spoken about like he was some scrawny teenager in need of tending to, as a glance darted in her direction confirmed.</p><p>“I’ll let myself out,” he muttered, and Relena found herself standing for literally not a single good reason. She edged past Lucrezia without making eye contact.</p><p>“You can, you know,” she started, and Heero paused on his way to the door. Paused, but, didn’t stop walking, so Relena had to follow him into the dark hallway by her dark bathroom. “You can have some of the roast. There’s extra. I made plenty.”</p><p>She couldn’t see him. He was dark on dark on dark even in sunlight, and with his back turned, it was only when she could see the whites of his eyes that she knew he’d turned to face her.</p><p>“What do you want,” he muttered.</p><p>The wine was making her feel brave. Brave and stupid. Absurdly, unforgivably stupid, willing to ignore the tone of this voice. “Nothing,” she answered, holding the glass with both hands. “Nothing at all.”</p><p>And it was...she could <em> feel </em> his gaze on her.</p><p>She could feel it on her face, and on the pounding heart inside her chest. On her electrified skin.</p><p>Heero sighed, looking at her.</p><p>And she couldn’t look away.</p><p>Relena couldn’t hear Lucrezia in the background. She couldn’t hear much of anything, not even the music 3A liked to play in the evenings, not even the sounds of someone walking on the floor overhead.</p><p>
  <em> What are you doing what are you doing what are you doing </em>
</p><p>“Goodbye, Relena,” he said, and before she’d even thought of a witty response, before she’d even wet her lips to <em> try</em>, he was through the door, and closing it firmly behind him.</p><p>Lucrezia made a noise from somewhere near her bedroom. She’d found the cake again.</p><p>And then the lights went back on.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Lucrezia didn’t stay the night.</p><p>Relena was awkward and distant after Heero left, and even she herself noticed after awhile. Within twenty minutes Lucrezia was making up some excuse, packing up the rest of the cake to take home with her, putting on her coat, kissing both of Relena’s cheeks in farewell. They had plans the following weekend but Relena couldn’t at the time remember what they were. It didn’t matter.</p><p>Relena was distracted as she went about cleaning up the apartment, after. She washed the dishes. Put away the candles. Changed into her pajamas, climbed into bed. It was late, afterall. Late and, she had no real plans in the morning anyway, but.</p><p>It took a long time to fall asleep. Her dreams were chaotic and troublesome, each one uncomfortable and just hovering on the edge of traumatic. She kept waking herself up from them, looking around her quiet, empty bedroom, closing her eyes again. She couldn’t settle. Her thoughts wouldn’t let her.</p><p>And she was just considering the idea of just getting up, of just giving up<em>, </em>when the other shoe dropped.</p><p>The radiators were connected. She knew this, intrinsically, because he’d never been able to fix one without fixing the other. So it shouldn’t make her so <em> mad, </em>so <em> frustrated</em>, when her bedroom radiator made a soft popping sound, when it made a <em> clunk </em> and a <em> hiss </em> that she recognized, now, when it suddenly revved up like a steam train, like a pot of water boiling over.</p><p>Relena grit her teeth over a strangled shout, and threw off the covers.</p><p>What time was it? It didn’t matter. Middle of the night didn’t matter. She shoved her feet into shoes, <em>yanked</em> her keys off the hook and <em>flung</em> open the door, heading straight for the stairs. It didn’t matter. None of it mattered. Oh she was <em>furious</em>.</p><p>The headache she’d foretold was just starting to form, each step down a dull hammer to the inside of her skull. It didn’t <em>matter</em>.</p><p>She was mad. She was <em> pissed, </em> really, the heightened frustration of lack of sleep, coupled with the way he’d just said <em> goodbye </em> to her like that and leftover embarrassment from Lucrezia - it all combined for a complete inability to calm down. What was wrong with him? Why couldn’t he fix a basic radiator? He’d had three tries so far. Three! It was practically the most basic, the most obvious, the most straight-forward piece of machinery in the building and <em> he couldn’t even fix it? </em></p><p>She stomped all the way across the basement level, and stopped right in front of his door, raising a fist and <em>banging</em> as loud as she could on the annoyingly and <em>idiosyncratically</em> labeled <em> B-A. </em></p><p>Heero’s door opened and Relena had to blink, because the lights were on inside, brighter than the dimmed hall. He was awake? What the hell time was it?</p><p>His eyes flared a little when he saw her, recognized her, one hand up on the jam, his other not letting go of the door, his lips pressing into a line.</p><p>Relena squared her shoulders.</p><p>Her eyes were adjusting.</p><p>And Heero wasn’t wearing a shirt.</p><p><em> He wasn’t wearing a shirt, </em>that was fine, she wasn’t paying attention, it didn’t matter, whatever.</p><p>Her voice was purely waspish.</p><p>“You didn’t fix it.”</p><p>His gaze narrowed.</p><p>“I did.”</p><p>“You didn’t. I need you to do your job. Or I need you to find me <em> someone </em> who can.”</p><p>“Someone who – “ he spat, irritation raising his voice to match hers. “You know what, sure. Go ahead. Use the Yellow Pages. Do whatever you want.”</p><p>“Do whatever I—“ she said, voice pitching even higher. “It’s your job! You’re supposed to be able to fix these things!”</p><p>“And I <em> did!</em>” he yelled back, or, he started to yell back, except, the last word, the <em> did</em>, it was well, it was cut off half-way.</p><p>Because. Well. Heero wasn’t alone.</p><p>He wasn’t alone in his apartment, and the person who he was with had appeared behind him in the distance, and she wasn’t wearing a shirt either.</p><p>“Relena?” Catherine asked, holding her shirt over her exposed bra. “Ahh I thought that was you.”</p><p>Relena’s blood was <em> thrumming </em> through her veins. She knew her eyes were shining with rage, knew she was so rarely this worked up. She was a boiling kettle with no room for steam. </p><p>Relena leaned so she could look past Heero, and when Catherine saw her face, the coy, sheepish expression she’d been sporting…hitched. “Um,” she started to say, but Relena cut her off. </p><p>“He’s absolute <em> crap,</em>” she said, voice like a storm, “at radiators.” </p><p>And then she spun on her heel and left.</p><p>There were thundering steps behind her before she’d even managed one hallway.</p><p>“That’s not fair.”</p><p>She didn’t want to turn around. She didn’t want him to get the last word in, either. She also thought she’d missed a turn and didn’t want him to notice she was lost. Relena spoke over her shoulder without slowing down.</p><p>“If the shoe fits, Heero. The radiator has you three to none.”</p><p>“<em>Relena!</em>” he shouted, he practically snarled. And against her better judgment, she swung around.</p><p>“What! Heero.” Her hands were wide at her sides. “<em>What.</em>”</p><p>He was glaring at her. Glaring with an anger she’d never seen. His voice was furious, deep, <em>loud</em>. “You don’t get to do this. You don’t get to <em>dictate</em> <em>my life</em>.”</p><p>“Dictate your—“ she had literally not a single idea what he meant. “I don’t even know what that means, but it doesn’t matter. I leave for work at eight twenty-five Monday morning. Feel free to let yourself in <em> after </em> I’m gone.”</p><p>Her chest was heaving. They were alone in the hallway. It was god knew what time in the morning. And Relena took a few daring steps forward, a mouse walking up to a lion.</p><p>“And take all your books with you when you come. I’m done with them, Heero.”</p><p>The rage was washing out of her system then, allowing room for feelings like sadness, regret, and guilt. She’d said - enough. She’d said all she wanted to say, and she didn’t want to see anything like hurt transition in his gaze.</p><p>“Your guest is waiting for you,” she said, voice spent. </p><p>And when Heero didn’t respond, when it didn’t  even seem like he was going to leave, she finally turned, and left for good.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The night passed in a blur. A hot, sweaty, despondent blur. She wasn’t sure she slept. She wasn’t sure she <em> woke</em>, but she did, surely, because she’d never had such vivid dreams about operating her own coffee pot, about washing her own hair. It was raining outside.</p><p>She should have been expecting him.</p><p>Really, she should have made a plan.</p><p>A plan to be out of the apartment. A plan to have someone else in it. But she’d made no plans, Dorothy’s public service announcements or no. She could have tried to go for a hike with Quatre and Trowa. To go see her parents upstate. To just get herself dressed and go to the library – <em> no </em> – she didn’t want to go to the library.</p><p>Because she started hearing the bangings from below her floor by mid-morning. She <em> knew </em> Master O. She knew he preferred to keep to himself, and knew that someone meddling was probably driving him insane. </p><p>In fact, by 10:30, she was definitely hearing raised voices. And she distinctly recognized both, even if she couldn’t make out what they were saying.</p><p>...She definitely should have made a plan.</p><p>By 10:42, there was a pounding knock on her front door.</p><p>For a terrible, childish moment, she considered not answering it. Just don’t answer, just hide in your own closet because the man has a key. </p><p>But - she couldn’t stomach it. She couldn’t stomach breakfast she could barely stomach coffee and she couldn’t even manage to get herself dressed in proper clothes.</p><p>Relena hovered by the end of the hallway to her front door, trying to figure out what to say. She could pretend she was just on her way out and hole up in Cather… Well.</p><p>“I know you’re in there.”</p><p>The voice was unmistakable. Even through the sounds of the rain, and the music from next door, and the steps on the floors above, she could still hear his voice.</p><p>“No you don’t,” she whispered, contrite, as she went to open it anyway.</p><p>Heero was leaning toward the doorway again, both arms propped on the jam. He looked up when the door opened, dark smudges beneath his eyes.</p><p>She knew she looked no better.</p><p>But maybe she could have put on a shirt.</p><p>It was too damn hot in her apartment for anything, and with the rain she couldn’t even keep her windows more than cracked. With nothing to do and too much adrenaline she’d been left doing exercise classes on her laptop all morning. She’d started with yoga (good old yoga), and then found it hadn’t quite suited her mood. So she’d tried one of those HIIT classes, which was moderately too hard, and then she tried barre, and that was okay. She was still in her sports bra and exercise shorts, because, well, she wasn’t going anywhere. And she’d more or less forgotten about her (perfectly fine) wardrobe choices until Heero was staring so adamantly at her face. </p><p>“Well?”</p><p>“I’m fixing it. Today.”</p><p>She scoffed, a little. “Whatever you say.” She held the door out of the way, and let Heero pass her by.</p><p>He had to work in her bedroom, so, she made the bed finally, glaring at the pattern to avoid glaring at him, then picked some work from her bag to attack in the dining room. She grabbed a thin cotton hoodie and threw it on, not bothering to zip it up because it was still hot and she honestly, well, she would wear a similar outfit during runs through the city in the summer so. Really it wasn’t too big of a deal, not exactly wearing a shirt.</p><p>The first <em> clang </em> set her teeth on edge.</p><p>“How long’s it going to be?” she called out, to more groans and hisses.</p><p>“<em>As long as it fucking takes</em>,” he seethed, to himself.</p><p>“<em>What?</em>”</p><p>“I said as long as it takes!” he called back, grunting, and Relena glowered at her open bedroom door.</p><p>She did not read a single word from her work assignment.</p><p>But she turned the pages anyway, each sound from beyond the wall grating on her already terrible mood. There wasn’t an established timeframe on this project, yet. She didn’t need to be working on it this weekend, but she would have, anyway, because it was raining, and had no other plans.</p><p>At one point she needed a pencil from her bedside table, and she stepped into her bedroom to get it.</p><p>Heero had apparently dismantled the entire god damn radiator and was putting it back together, piece by piece. He had a book open on the ground next to him, and his shirt had been forfeighted in lieu of a rag.</p><p>She tilted her chin up, just a bit, and went back to her makeshift desk without a second glance.</p><p>Fine. Just as well.</p><p>The hour stretched and Heero continued to work while Relena pretended to, a frustrating pretense while she trying to rationalize her terrible mood. She couldn’t even tell what the project was about, really, and she didn’t really care.</p><p>“It’s fixed.”</p><p>Relena put down the paper she was staring past.</p><p>And she turned to look at him.</p><p>“I should believe you?”</p><p>“Yeah.”</p><p>She scoffed, again. Goodness, she was being cruel. Cruel and it was all his fault. He was making her be <em> so inappropriate </em> to her building superintendent.</p><p>“If it breaks again I’m throwing it the fuck away.”</p><p>She frowned at him, slightly.</p><p>“Fine. I’ll get your books.”</p><p>She thought she’d – she really thought she’d prepared for this, for the flash of pain that sparked in her belly. Relena stood and twisted, looking for the first. She could’ve been doing this, she realized. She could have been collecting them this whole time.</p><p>“Don’t.”</p><p>It hadn’t occurred to her that Heero hadn’t moved, yet.</p><p>Relena kept a hand on the back of her chair.</p><p>“Don’t?” she said, still annoyed. “You don’t want them back?”</p><p>“I – “ Heero closed his eyes, briefly, taking a breath through his nose. “I’m covered in shit. I’ll come back when I’m clean.”</p><p>Her hand tightened on the chair. “I’d rather you take them now.”</p><p>“<em>Relena – </em>“</p><p>Anger replaced the pain, a spark to an ember, lit at the way he said her name. It raced right through her.</p><p>“I don’t <em>want them</em>, Heero. And surely there is someone <em>else</em> you’d rather be giving them to.”</p><p>His eyes blazed. “Is that what this is about? I’m pretty sure I could say the same to <em> you</em>, Relena.”</p><p>“That was – “ Oh goodness. Of course. She’d known what it looked like. An incredulous laugh. “You have no idea what that was.”</p><p>His glare narrowed. “I know what it looked like.”</p><p>“Oh, so I can call up Chang Wufei, or Catherine, or half the fucking building and ask them what it <em> looked like?</em>”</p><p>
  <em> What are you doing what are you doing </em>
</p><p>Heero dropped his tool kit. It landed, with a resounding <em> bang </em> that shook the floorboards. Master O was going to hate her forever. But she could barely spare him a thought. She could barely think of his name. Heero had dropped it and was advancing on her, advancing so quickly that her heart hitched into her throat, as she instinctively retreated, step by step that Heero matched with unrelenting focus, until her back was slamming into her built-in shelves.</p><p>Heero was on top of her then, his arms grabbing her wrists, pinning them painfully in place. He dragged one above her head.</p><p>There was a moment, of just breathing. Glaring at each other, lips buttoned, Relena’s chest heaving small breaths above her sports bra, Heero’s naked chest rising in kind. She could count his individual eyelashes. She was sure he could count her own.</p><p>An insane heat was blooming inside of her, some terrible flower between her thighs.</p><p>“What do you <em> want</em>, Relena,” Heero murmured, voice low, grave, each word a scratch.</p><p>Her lips were dry. She wouldn’t dare wet them.</p><p>“Nothing,” she whispered.</p><p>The lie hovered between them.</p><p>“That’s bullshit.”</p><p>“It’s not.”</p><p>What was she doing.</p><p>It was a dare, maybe. It was maybe a – The heat was racing through her veins now, pushing the anger aside. She felt it in her arms and legs. She felt it in her face.</p><p>Heero’s head dropped. It dropped, and she didn’t even flinch, as his lips hovered in such easy kissing distance. What was she doing, what was she doing. She refused to move. A perfect statue. Her lips were dry and soft for kissing. Her chest nearly brushing against his. </p><p>And everything shifted into focus at once. </p><p>Just.</p><p>…What would it take...to touch? </p><p>…What would it take...to kiss? </p><p>A soft sigh, maybe. A shift in her weight. A murmured word.</p><p>“This is all you <em> ever want,</em>” Heero said, and the words curled around her. Curled and curled.</p><p>Her throat felt dry. “That’s bullshit,” she repeated, and her voice was so much softer than his.</p><p>His face tilted, then. He didn’t pull away, exactly, but she could see his face again, more fully. And maybe she expected him to sneer. Maybe she expected him to say something cutting. But as the silence stretched, as the pure and potent heat built inside of her, something finally occurred to her:</p><p>He might - oh god - oh god he might <em> want her</em>, to kiss him.</p><p>The thought was insane. </p><p>Because her very next thought was - <em> it honestly seemed like </em> - like he was <em> waiting for her</em>, to kiss him.</p><p>This had not occurred to her with clarity, that she was not alone in feeling. Her brain was suddenly too full, it was overflowing, she could not process it at once. No. She had to be wrong. This was some ridiculous power move, some brutish display of dominance. Right?</p><p>
  <em> Right? </em>
</p><p>What are you doing?</p><p>Because it didn’t feel like that, then.</p><p>Heero wet his own lips.</p><p>It felt even less like he was waiting, and more like he was giving her...the space to decide, almost. The space to <em> think</em>.</p><p>And that was absolutely insane.</p><p>Relena inhaled a shaky, awful breath.</p><p>
  <em>What are you doing what are you doing what are you doing</em>
</p><p>And kissed him.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. like a schoolkid waiting for the spring</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>how does this keep getting longer??? it'll be six chapters now, probably.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Heero did not like his building.</p><p>There was no attached garage, so, he had to pay to park his motorcycle two blocks away, which he found unnerving for one of the few possessions he actually liked. The mechanical, pedal, whatever bike he could keep in his (basement) apartment, and somewhat reluctantly got more use. There were plenty of mornings when he didn’t sleep after taking on a freelance job, or reading half a textbook, or <em>both</em>, really, and his body and his mind were desperate for exercise.</p><p>It wasn’t too hard to bike through the streets of downtown Boston. People were dicks, sure, but people were dicks everywhere.</p><p>What he mostly didn’t like about his building was all the god damn work that went with. Hardwood floors got scratched and couldn’t be wet. Old as <em>fucking dirt</em> pipes leaked. The windows were all wood framed, and when was the last time you had to fucking <em>re-rope a sash cord</em> on a window made a hundred years ago. It didn’t make for a pleasant afternoon.</p><p>Sure he’d chosen the work. Sort of. At the time it had seemed novel and vaguely interesting (<em>different</em>), when his mind felt like an atrophied mess. Keep a god-damn building running? Sure.</p><p>It was just...</p><p>It was the <em>people</em>, that pissed him off.</p><p>The building was just so full of fucking <em>people.</em></p><p>Miss Hanch, in 1A, liked to bitch about Mrs. Dover, in 1B, who apparently had a cat who liked to piss on every square inch of her apartment and occasionally jumped out her own window. If that old bitch died while Heero was still super, he’d probably just burn the building down before dealing with it.</p><p>Which, well. It wasn’t really to say...that there weren’t perks.</p><p>He...he hadn’t really been expecting it, the first time.</p><p>Interpersonal relationships were not on his list of priorities when moving across the fucking country. He had other shit on his mind. He was going to plant, do the ridiculous two-year grad program in one, return triumphant to Seattle, and then shove that degree into the back of Treize’s fucking throat. And then probably immediately leave, and get a job somewhere else, because...he probably didn’t even want to work there, anymore, anyway.</p><p>Hm.</p><p>So, all that to say that he hadn’t noticed <em>being noticed</em> until 4C had called about her radiator one night during his second week on the job, and then answered the door in some rather choice clothing.</p><p>He’d been about to leave (“<em>where’s your radiator</em>”) after figuring it out, but then, he sort of thought...fuck it. Fuck it, honestly. He had no friends. He had no interest in making friends, really. And here was a person who was literally offering the use of their body for whatever, and, he literally hadn’t touched another human like that in months, and.</p><p>Yeah.</p><p>Fuck it.</p><p>After things started with Elaine he started to finally realize that other people were readily available, and the building started to grow on him. It was a bunch of one-bedrooms, this place, so it had a lot of single young people who had the resources to afford the space for themselves while also paying for proper hygiene. Or couples.</p><p>Hm.</p><p>Couples.</p><p>He’d noticed 2C’s blush in the laundry room, but hadn’t quite worked up the nerve to act on it. There was lower hanging fruit, after all.</p><p>And then he got the call from Relena.</p><p> </p><p>He hadn’t honesty slept in a few days when she’d called, powering through a few too many things at once, and he was just five minutes in to the most perfect sleep of his life when his phone started ringing a call from the preprogrammed <em>3B</em>.</p><p>And it was...maybe not his best first impression.</p><p>In retrospect it struck him that she took it in stride, which, maybe he didn’t deserve, but.</p><p>Okay, the other thing he noticed was too obvious to mention, really: she was very attractive, even though, again, there were many attractive people around. She had a pretty face, was slender, <em>athletic</em>, even, with long legs, long hair. She had this way of looking at him that made him feel listened to, without knowing a god damn thing she was thinking while he spoke. Sometimes he knew <em>exactly</em> what she was thinking, though, so.</p><p>And she liked reading books.</p><p>He...he wasn’t expecting that.</p><p> </p><p>There honest to god did seem to be something wrong with her radiator (old fucking building) which he...had to do some research on. He tried checking the records from Doctor J but got nowhere. The man left shit records, and now he was dead. There were tools he’d never seen before in the back of some of the closets, and if he ever felt like touching them...shit he’d probably just throw them into the river, actually, because he got the impression that Doctor J was a bit of a freak.</p><p>It probably wasn’t going to go anywhere with Relena, honestly. After meeting her the first time he noticed that she wasn’t one of the <em>noticers</em>, didn’t seem to do much around the building besides enter and exit, and, there was enough else for Heero to do. There were other attractive people. </p><p>The second time her radiator broke he actually believed her radiator broke, and that pissed him off more than it should because he’d fucking read a book and everything. He’d trudged up to her apartment, realized they both apparently ordered the same things from the Thai restaurant down the block sometimes, and set about his work.</p><p>He only...he only mentioned the book, because she did. That’s all. He was tired and grouchy and her apartment was warm and smelled like good food, so.</p><p>It was nice of her not to wake him up. He hadn’t been sleeping well, for a lot of reasons. He couldn’t explain why he fell asleep on her couch, honestly, because his apartment was also warm and also often smelled like food, so.</p><p>He...he also couldn’t explain, why, he went back to his apartment, and...combed his shelves...until he’d found three of his favorites, that he hadn’t seen on hers.</p><p>He remembered staring at them, in the middle of the night, after walking back in to her warm strange apartment, knowing she was dead asleep in the next room. </p><p>What was he doing? He...it was <em>weird</em>, right? They barely knew each other. He had no interest in pursuing legitimate friendships in any capacity. She’d made it pretty fucking clear she wasn’t interested in him, sexually or otherwise, so. What the <em>fuck</em> was he doing, scribbling her a god damn <em>thank you note</em> in the middle of the night and leaving it where she could find it?</p><p>It was just. He should have stopped it sooner. He should have stopped it right then and there.</p><p> </p><p>His classes were easy. The work came easy. The accompaniment came easy. And yet he found he didn’t pay half as close attention to everything else as he did his book exchange project. He blew off a whole 36-hours of everything when she returned his favor. They were good books, he told himself. Just good books he’d never read before, and, honestly it had been a while since he felt like reading anything at all.</p><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><p> </p><p>So. He really should have should have stopped it sooner. He should have noticed it when everyone else did.</p><p>Heero was staring at his ceiling, contemplating the hundred things he had to do that day, none of which had anything to do with Wufei, who was finally getting the fuck out of his apartment after a morning visit. He hadn’t complained; hadn’t been particularly interested but whatever, Wufei was unpredictable and kind of weird like that. He was quietly getting dressed next to Heero’s bed, and noticed Heero’s phone buzz first.</p><p>“You got a text.”</p><p>Heero didn’t entirely understand why he <em>lunged</em> like that, but he did, unlocking his phone, reading through the text quickly, an uncontrollable and unbearable smirk creasing his cheek as the words processed. He started texting back immediately.</p><p>He didn’t really notice as Wufei got himself the rest of the way dressed, only really looked up when he heard the click of the door opening, Wufei seeing himself out.</p><p>Heero frowned.</p><p>Was he...<em>huh</em>. He was probably being rude. Shit. He glanced back at his phone.</p><p>[<em>Okay. Scratch that. Couple on the bus just started …</em></p><p>The grin returned, Wufei forgotten, as he typed out his reply.</p><p>And damn if he wasn’t grinning like that, the rest of the god damn morning.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>He couldn’t exactly pinpoint when he started to be...interested in her.</p><p>He hadn’t meant to be. Fucking hell he really wasn’t trying. It was an accident, a mistake from the beginning, probably. No friends, no time. Get through the year, get vengeance, move on. And maybe that’s why he didn’t quite notice it, when, he started taking their repartee so...seriously.</p><p>Because he’d just been riling up Chang after taking out the garbage, because riling up Chang was like going to the gun range and practicing on moving targets, or something. Mildly challenging, somewhat engaging, <em>different</em>. And something had made Wufei clam up again and when Heero turned to look, he realized that that something was Relena, and, he wasn’t at all expecting or prepared for the way his heart dropped right out of his fucking chest.</p><p> </p><p>He’d. Well. He recognized the feeling.</p><p>That was probably the worst part, somehow.</p><p> </p><p>Treize had… Well, Heero understood, why he’d blocked Heero’s transfer. A part of him knew it wasn’t totally just to piss him off, although, surely a large fucking part of it was just to piss him off.</p><p>No it was...more than that.</p><p>As a general rule and a matter of public safety, Heero tried...very hard, not to think about Duo, for the most part. That was a box he kept carefully closed, with no intention of opening any time soon.</p><p>So.</p><p>He recognized the feeling, yes.</p><p>It was probably best left as just that.</p><p> </p><p>He tried not to analyze it. It was too easy to <em>over analyze it</em>, really, so really he tried to do anything but. He had classes. He went for a run. But these mindless tasks reminded him of all the ways he’d been honest to god flirting with her, probably, without even realizing that he was completely flirting with her.</p><p>There was...there was honestly a difference, in what he was doing with Elaine (okay not Elaine), Wufei, 1E, that barista going to med school, all of it. That was goal-oriented, really. A means to an end.</p><p>With Relena it had just been...he’d been <em>enjoying</em> it.</p><p>He liked hearing her opinions. He liked thinking about her reading the books he gave her. He liked that he saw her at the library once and she was looking at books about vintage plumbing.</p><p>She was just. <em>Different</em>. No, not even that. She wasn’t different at all. The feelings were all the same.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <span>So he sent a text (</span>
  <em>
    <span>we should talk, </span>
  </em>
  <span>is what he went with, after an agonizing twenty minutes of work). He texted and then he tried to talk to her. He tried, and, she didn’t want to talk to him, and he figured he’d just really fucked it up but that was fine, that was okay, he would survive. It was no big deal, really, just a person he’d had – well – he didn’t know what, but, he didn’t </span>
  <em>
    <span>need her</span>
  </em>
  <span>. He didn’t need her to </span>
  <em>
    <span>survive</span>
  </em>
  <span>, or anything.</span>
</p><p>And then she called him.</p><p>And he thought he had a chance.</p><p>He brought the tools because he was supposed to bring the tools, and when he first saw all the candles – <em>he knew it was stupid he knew it was stupid</em> – but a part of him…hoped, maybe. Hoped and then,</p><p>She wasn’t alone.</p><p>She wasn’t alone, and some tall, pretty whatever was sitting at her dining room table, clearly enjoying herself. Shit. Fuck. Shit. He hadn’t seen her with anyone. He hadn’t seen her with <em>anyone, </em>he thought that maybe he had a – shit!</p><p>He fixed the radiator. He fixed it, and he knew it was over, and when 4D was wandering outside his door later with a basket of laundry that was clearly mostly negligee he just thought <em>fuck, everything</em> and invited her in.</p><p>They’d honestly been about to get down to it when there was a knock on his door, a <em>pounding,</em> really, and <em>fuck. Everything.</em></p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Look, this is just how it went: Duo had also pissed him off, at first. He was obnoxious, and liked to needle him just because he could. The first time they had sex it was because Duo had overruled him at a meeting, and Heero hadn’t realized just how much he was fucking into him, until he had the overwhelming urge to shut him up with his mouth.</p><p>It was probably how it always went with him except he had nothing to compare it to, really. Duo had been his only significant relationship in his whole adult life, his only source of reference for what a couple could or should look like.</p><p>And when it ended...or rather, when it <em>imploded</em>...that was his fault too.</p><p>
  <em>“Heero! You can’t just – you can’t just disappear for weeks at a fucking time!”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“I had an assignment.”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“I know you had a fucking assignment!”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“If you knew then why are you <strong>pissed</strong>.”</em>
</p><p> </p><p>It took awhile to really….in any way...get over it. They worked together, for one. They fucking worked together. And neither was particularly tactful about their sudden and very intense disdain for each other. It had gotten old for everyone, after awhile, including his boss, who was more than willing to force them to keep working together as a perverse form of punishment. </p><p>More for Heero, anyway. </p><p>Duo had always been the more popular one.</p><p> </p><p>All that to say that it just surprised him, a little, to develop something even close to <em>feelings</em> for someone. He wasn’t interested. He wasn’t looking. He had his priorities set. Professor G had owed him a favor and helped his application get on the right desks at MIT, so that he got a place even after the deadline had passed. Whatever. He paid in full, time of admission. Whatever. The only good day was being able to tell Treize in person, with a triumphant sort of flourish, that he was quitting. The only good day was getting to see Duo’s face after the news had gotten out that he was leaving.</p><p>And storming through the halls after Relena, he felt more than he had in the whole time since he left. He was pissed, because there he was, opening himself up again, and for fucking nothing. What the <em>fuck</em> was it all for, all the feelings, if they went to fucking waste like that. No one loved him. No one cared about him. 4D was literally in her bra only because he had an attractive body; she had no idea what he was like at all.</p><p>Is that what he should be doing with Relena? Just fuck her, fuck her like all the rest, just to get it out of his system? Is that what she <em>wanted?</em></p><p>That was the fucking worst part.</p><p>He had</p><p>No</p><p>Idea</p><p>What she wanted.</p><p>But he did know that he wanted her.</p><p> </p><p>So he fixed the radiator. He went barging into 2B’s apartment and went jamming around from below, and when that was done he went right upstairs to Relena’s apartment and demanded entry. He couldn’t imagine she didn’t know he was coming. The floors in this building were shit; you could hear all the way up on a bad day. <em>Just let it be done</em>, he kept thinking. Just let this fucking radiator mess be done with so he could move the fuck on with his life.</p><p>But she opened the door, and her cheeks were flushed, and she was wearing nothing, and her hair was damp, and it was just…shit. He was so fucked. He’d always hated how indifferent she was to her beauty. It wasn’t like she neglected her looks; he’d seen inside her medicine cabinet, he knew she worked out. But it was mostly like, she knew she was pretty, and just didn’t seem to care at all, didn’t even seem to think it was <em>relevant.</em></p><p>And his books were still everywhere.</p><p>He took the fucking radiator apart, piece by piece. It was going back together, it was going back together <em>correctly</em>, and then it would be done. Just…done.</p><p>He was going to just leave. He really was. And then she yelled at him, and he just…he just sort of lost it, almost. He’d been thinking too much. He hadn’t been thinking enough. He moved on instinct, he moved without even really having a <em>plan</em>.</p><p>And he was getting ready to be hit or something, really just <em>daring </em>her to do it, to make it clear she didn’t want him, wanted nothing to do with him so he could move on, when…</p><p>She kissed him.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. just sittin here, waiting for you to</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>this wasn't going to be a lemon and then it was, so, i'm sorry? Yeah.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p> </p><p>She kissed him.</p><p>It was meant to have the same impact as a slap in the face: a peck, a jab, some wounding thing that would shut him up and make him leave.</p><p>But she’d never been good at physical combat. That had never been her strength. And Heero absorbed the press of her lips with the ease of someone well-versed in hand to hand, an expert soldier trained just for this.</p><p>Their lips met and when Heero didn’t pull away, when he pulled her in with him, horror and embarrassment flashed across her face, her soft vessels flooding with blood. He was <em>kissing her.</em> Not as a joke. He was <em>kissing her.</em></p><p>A thousand thoughts split through her head, multiplying wildly. She couldn’t keep them straight. She barely wanted to keep them straight. Heero was kissing her.</p><p>And she was kissing back.</p><p>Heero pressed his hips against hers, pushing her back against the shelves. He dropped her wrists and grabbed the sides of her face instead, angling them both so the kiss could deepen. Oh god.</p><p><em>What was happening</em> – she couldn’t think. She could barely keep up with the feeling of it all, with what she was doing with her own body, the warmth spilling through her. Her mouth opened on shock, probably, on the pure shock of it all. The rest of her was kissing him back, bowing with him, her thigh rising against the outside of his leg. The blood inside of her was singing. It was singing, and she was kissing him, and she did not know what to do with her hands.</p><p>Heero broke his mouth away.</p><p>They were both panting, still. Maybe they’d never stopped. Her lips felt swollen, heavy, bruised from the attack.</p><p>“What do you <em>want</em>, Relena,” he ground out, harsh and desperate, and Relena’s mind could not at all process higher functions like <em>thought</em> and <em>speech</em>. His thumb stroked against her cheek, touching just the edges of her lips.</p><p>
  <em>What is happening what is happening</em>
</p><p>“What do you <em>want</em>,” he sighed.</p><p>“I—I want you to leave.”</p><p>The silence that stretched, then. It went on and on. Her throat felt dry. She wasn’t sure what Heero was thinking. His expression had frozen. She had no handle on her own thoughts. What had she said? Leave? Is that what she wanted? <em>Is that what she wanted?</em></p><p>“No you don’t,” he said back, and he hadn’t moved at all.</p><p>“I do. Get out.”</p><p>He pulled away then, pulled his upper torso back immediately, and the vacuum of cold that rushed in –</p><p>It was all happening too fast. Maybe that was the problem. She just needed to think, honestly. Just needed to <em>think</em> –</p><p>She nearly pulled him back in.</p><p>Her fingers twitched. She couldn’t tell if Heero understood or not. But he looked at them anyway, frowning, apparently now…avoiding eye contact. Guilt exploded within her then, crushing her insides, then, twisting them tight. That she deserved. <em>What was happening</em></p><p>She pushed off the bookcase when he pushed off of her, breaking apart briskly. Relena went to the dining room table and anchored her hands on its surface, the largest and most obvious piece of furniture within reach. Her breathing was still a mess. She couldn’t turn around. She couldn’t turn around. She heard Heero grabbing his toolkit.</p><p>The warmth inside her…oh what was she going to do with that. It would take one friendly gesture and Heero would be on the floor, in her bed, anywhere she wanted. Right? Isn’t that what was happening? Oh god.</p><p>The front door opened. Oh god. She whipped around.</p><p>But he was already gone.</p><p>And Relena had no idea what she was doing.</p><p>And the silence stretched on and on.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>“Did you <em>run here?</em>”</p><p>Relena was dripping. She was dripping sweat, she was dripping rainwater, she was just – it was getting all over the floor in the hall outside of Lucrezia’s apartment. </p><p>“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. It’s just – how did you know you were over my brother?”</p><p>“Your – “</p><p>“My brother, yeah.” There was a sharp and sudden silence. This was not something they spoke of often.</p><p>“Relena…” Lucrezia started to say, on an undercurrent of worry, while Relena stepped inside. “What’s going on?” </p><p>She definitely noticed that Lucrezia wasn’t answering the question but elected to let it slide. She was thirsty. Really thirsty, and her shoes were soaked. She yanked them off, one at a time, dropping them and walking directly toward the kitchen. It was late in the afternoon.</p><p>She’d been there plenty of times. She knew where the glasses were. Relena grabbed one, filling it from the tap, gulping it heartily, refilling it before she’d had a chance to hear Lucrezia’s feet pad into the kitchen behind her.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” Relena said, on a wet gasp. “I’ll uh. I’ll clean up after myself.” Her wet socks had left a trail on Lucrezia’s hardwood floors. </p><p>“It’s fine.”</p><p><em>It’s not</em>, Relena wanted to respond.</p><p>“Is everything okay?” Lucrezia asked again.</p><p>Relena held on to her glass, staring out the window over the sink, breathing hard. The expanse of the city stretched in front of her, all the way across town to her own small corner, her own small piece of her own reality. It put things in perspective, a little, maybe. No. Not really.</p><p>It was still raining.</p><p>“Come sit down with me. Should I open a bottle of wine?”</p><p>Relena shook her head quick. “Haven’t eaten,” she explained, and real concern flashed on her friend's face. </p><p>“Okay. Well. Let’s sit first.”</p><p>Relena...nodded, her breathing still labored. It was still all tangled under her ribs, a painful mess of nerves and pressure. She hadn’t even taken the straightest route. She didn’t want to know what time it was, but the light was fading in its path through the dark, full clouds. It felt like she’d run for hours. She probably had run for hours. She was going to be so sore tomorrow, but, she’d probably sleep first. </p><p>Relena grabbed a towel from the guest bathroom, putting it on one of Lucrezia’s sleek modern lounge chairs before sitting down. Everything in here always seemed new and untouched. Lucrezia had…always been vague about her job; it was something military-adjacent but that’s as much as Relena knew. She travelled a lot? After awhile it seemed inappropriate to ask.</p><p>Her breathing was finally starting to calm down.</p><p>“I can’t believe you didn’t break an ankle,” Lucrezia said, standing over her, handing over Relena’s forgotten glass of water. She took it, with a glance at her friend.</p><p>“Thanks.”</p><p>Her friend didn’t move away all at once.</p><p>“I’m serious. Do you know how far away you live? You never run in the rain.”</p><p>Relena dropped her gaze, staring at the floor instead.</p><p>“Something…happened.”</p><p>The mood immediately changed. It happened so quick.</p><p>“Something <em>bad?</em>” </p><p>Lucrezia took the nearest surface, sitting at Relena’s level. Relena looked up, catching her friend’s potent concern.</p><p>“No,” Relena started to say, before shaking her head. “Or, yes, or, I’m really – I’m not sure.” She looked into Lucrezia’s eyes. Licked her lips.</p><p>“Heero and I…we kissed.”</p><p>The tension on Lucrezia’s face…faded. It faded, and changed instead to a gentle sort of confusion, and then, she tilted her head to the side.</p><p>“Who is <em>Heero?</em>”</p><p>Relena almost laughed. Honestly it was almost funny. She took a sip of the water.</p><p>“The – the superintendent. You met him last night. He came to fix the radiator.”</p><p>Clarity cleared her gaze. “Ah,” she said. “Yes, I thought – well – okay. That’s Heero.”</p><p>“That’s Heero.”</p><p>“And you kissed.”</p><p>“And we kissed.”</p><p>“Sometime since I saw you last night.”</p><p>“More like half an hour before I put on my running shoes.”</p><p>“So this was very recent, then.”</p><p>Relena stared at her glass of water. She sighed. “Yes.”</p><p>Lucrezia dropped her head into Relena’s line of sight. “And this is…bad?”</p><p>Relena looked up, so her friend straightened. “I don’t know.”</p><p>Lucrezia wet her lips again, nodding sagely. “Ah. I think I’m starting to understand. This was not necessarily a spontaneous thing.”</p><p>Relena winced. Maybe she’d been not very forthcoming with her friends.</p><p>“We’ve been…talking…for awhile.”</p><p>“Talking?”</p><p>“Sort of. He’s my building’s super. My radiator keeps breaking.”</p><p>“Relena.”</p><p>“And…we’ve been talking. Texting, mostly. Kind of a lot. There’s been this – thing.”</p><p>Lucrezia was still frowning, a bit, but she was willing to take the benefit of the doubt. She tilted her head again. </p><p>“Do you like him?”</p><p>A pause. Relena looked at her friend, worrying her lower lip. “I...don’t know. I barely know him.” </p><p>“You barely know him?” Relena bit her lip and held it. “Well,” Lucrezia continued. “Hm. What do you know about him?”</p><p>She thought about that for maybe too long. Was this the big problem? That she liked him – maybe liked him a lot – and she felt like she had no reasonable reason <em>why?</em> Their book conversations had never really gone beyond that, just about books, and the prescient topics related to, books. They’d rarely gotten past the “this is good and you should read it” stage with anything, and, well. Why hadn’t they.</p><p>“He likes books,” she offered, on a sigh, reclining in the chair.</p><p>“And he’s very attractive.”</p><p>Relena gave her a look. </p><p>“What just because I don’t want to sleep with him and I met him once while eating cake I can’t admit that he’s attractive? He’s smoking, girl.”</p><p>“He’s seeing other people. I don’t think I could go in with the reasonable expectation that he would stop.”</p><p>Lucrezia’s face was attempting a mask of indifference, but, she wasn’t very good at it. Her displeasure was breaking through, a bit, somewhere around her eyes.</p><p>“Well. How do you feel about that?”</p><p>Was this therapy? Maybe this was therapy.</p><p>“I feel…” she couldn’t decide. “I don’t know. Lost.” She looked out the window. “I feel lost.”</p><p>Lucrezia’s mask...softened, somewhat. Softened, and then her lips cracked, on a small, affectionate smile. </p><p>“Lost isn’t bad,” she said, and Relena fought the urge to sigh again. </p><p>“No,” she agreed, after a moment. “Lost isn’t bad.”</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>She stayed for dinner, delivery, and showered while Lucrezia got her a change of clothes. They watched some crap TV, talked some more about Heero, and work, and plans for later, and Lucrezia offered her second bedroom if Relena wanted to stay.</p><p>She honestly considered it, for a moment. She did. But she declined. Her mind had been working in the background, as they chose a pizza place. As she turned down the offer for a beer, or glass of wine, or a god damn margarita. As they chose something to watch, waited for the food to arrive.</p><p>As she stood naked in the shower, considering whether to shave.</p><p>She got a Lyft to take her back home, and spent the whole ride staring out the window, trying to ignore the thrum of blood in her veins. It had stopped raining, finally, the ground wet under the tires, puddles splashing as people misjudged their steps in the dark.</p><p>Relena walked up to her building, keys in her hand. She shouldn’t. She really shouldn’t. </p><p>Her skin felt uncomfortable under the clothes: joggers, a shirt, and a sweater, its knit chunky, hiding the fact that she wasn’t wearing a bra. Her running clothes were in a bag and she’d  wash them later; it felt like too much to use Lucrezia’s set. </p><p>She…<em>really</em> shouldn’t.</p><p>She let herself in to her building, took the stairs to her apartment. It wasn’t even late yet. She let herself into her apartment, the rooms dark and lukewarm. Comfortable. She turned on a light, but it seemed too bright. She turned on the lamp by the couch instead, then the lamp by her bed.</p><p>She kept glancing at the radiator.</p><p>She <em>shouldn’t</em>.</p><p>Her belly was full, her hair clean and nearly dry. She’d shaved her legs. Relena looked at her bookshelf, trying to talk herself out of it, maybe. Not even trying too hard.</p><p>She’d been inside for barely a few minutes, not having accomplished anything, before she crossed to the shelf, and pulled off the giant, metal bookend she’d found at a flea market once. Relena’d had to carry it around all day after finding it first thing, her friends teasing her all day for her devotion to it. But she liked it.</p><p>And maybe this is why she had it.</p><p>She walked up to her radiator, and bit the inside of her cheek, her breathing speeding up, just a bit, of its own accord.</p><p>This was stupid. This was so incredibly stupid. Maybe he wasn’t even home. Maybe he wasn’t even interested, anymore. He’d worked so hard, actually. He’d worked <em>so hard</em> to fix this thing.</p><p>She shouldn’t.</p><p>She <em>shouldn’t.</em></p><p>Relena took a deep breath, and dropped the bookend on the radiator.</p><p>Something <em>twanged</em>, and, there was definitely an uptick in the heat. She winced. Her breath was coming too fast now. No turning back. <em>No turning back</em>. She went back to the couch, pulled her phone off the cushions. Her thumbs hovered as she considered texting. No. She hit dial.</p><p>He didn’t answer the phone.</p><p>She dialed again.</p><p>This time, on ring three –</p><p>She had no indication that he’d answered the phone. It simply stopped ringing, and after a moment, she could hear the acoustic nothingness of his apartment.</p><p>“Heero?” she asked, her skin still so warm.</p><p>A pause. “I’m here.”</p><p>She couldn’t even exhale. <em>Don’t.</em> No. <em>Don’t stop</em>. “I need you to come up.”</p><p>Another pause.</p><p>“Why.”</p><p>Why? Why. “Because,” she started, wetting her lips. “My radiator broke.”</p><p>She could hear his tangled sigh, after a moment.</p><p>“Relena,” he breathed.</p><p>“I’m serious. It’s broken.”</p><p>There was a silence so long, or maybe it wasn’t long at all. Maybe she was just – “I’m serious,” she added, feeling like she had to. “Heero, it’s broken.”</p><p>She could hear him, as it sounded like he was rubbing his face.</p><p>“Fine,” he murmured, and her shoulders finally relaxed, just a bit. And before she could say anything else, he hung up the phone.</p><p>Relena looked around her apartment. It was dark out, she could see the stars. She didn’t know what to do with herself. She took up a perch on the couch, staring at the spot where they’d kissed. Maybe this was a mistake. Some huge, awful mistake. That’s all it was. She didn’t need this. And maybe it wouldn’t even— She didn’t need him. They’d messed it up already. They never should have been doing it from the beginning.</p><p>Maybe he wouldn’t even come.</p><p>Her top pet peeve: not acting on your <em>emotions.</em></p><p>There was a tentative knock on her door.</p><p>Relena swallowed. She took a quick breath. And she stood, and went to the door.</p><p>When she opened it, Heero strode in. Quick, efficient. He went right past her, no eye contact necessary. Maybe she should have turned on more lights. She was barely thinking.</p><p>Relena closed the door, and followed Heero’s path into her living room.</p><p>He was crouched by her radiator, again, his head bowed.</p><p>And she realized, that, she hadn’t even picked up the bookend. Heero’s hand reached out, and was touching it now, tilting it on the floor, probably figuring out what it was. Whatever. There was no need to pretend she didn’t know what she was doing. <em>For a good time.</em></p><p>Heero’s head angled back toward her, but he looked no higher than the floor. Then he turned back around, and reached to a valve, something, along the bottom edge. He twisted it, and she could hear as the hiss of increased heat…stopped.</p><p>There were no other sounds in her apartment. She was still by the doorway to the room.</p><p>Heero stood, one fluid gesture. He was always doing that, moving with such ease through the world.</p><p>“It’s fixed,” he said, turning toward her. She should have turned on more lights.</p><p>“Okay,” she answered, wetting her lips again. They were still so dry.</p><p>Neither was moving.</p><p>She realized that, she was blocking the exit, maybe. He would have to walk around her to get out. God, what was she doing.</p><p>“Relena,” Heero sighed.</p><p>“I know what I’m doing.”</p><p>He didn’t—he didn’t even move at that. He swallowed. “You do?”</p><p>Her breath was warm in her lungs. She nodded. “I do.”</p><p>Heero turned to look out the window, sharp. He seemed to be thinking too fast, seemed to be – she didn’t know.</p><p>She took one, terrible, brave step into the room.</p><p>“I know what I’m doing, Heero.”</p><p>He turned around. He hadn’t moved, yet. “No you don’t.”</p><p>Did he think she was some blushing virgin? Her cheeks weren’t warm, everything was. <em>She shouldn’t. </em></p><p>Relena took off her sweater. His gaze didn’t change. Didn’t waver either, looking at her face. She hadn’t moved another step forward, yet. It was his turn. “You want me to take off the rest?”</p><p>She could see as he swallowed, again.</p><p>“What makes you think – “ he didn’t even finish the sentence. Of course he didn’t. They were both being idiots.</p><p>His gaze…she nearly released her breath…it finally moved. It traveled down the rest of her body, and Relena found herself leaning her shoulders back, her spine elongating, just in her t-shirt, joggers, underwear, clean hair. She tended not to think much about what she looked like. As she’d grown, she’d been told enough. Former lovers had been generous with praise. There were more important things.</p><p>“How do I know you’re not going to just change your mind again,” he ground out.</p><p>She stared back at him. “You don’t.”</p><p>He looked away again, her words seeming to permeate. The corner of his lips twitched, and she heard her words repeated, under his breath. <em>You don’t.</em></p><p>“I already took off my sweater.”</p><p>He looked back. And there it was again. The beat of just looking. Fuck. And then Heero took a breath.</p><p>“Yeah,” he said, and he crossed the room in four easy strides.</p><p>She was prepared for the brunt of it. Honestly, she was prepared for his initial attack. His hands went to the back of her spine and the back of her head, and he kissed her, with all the unrelenting passion of having done it once before.</p><p>Her blood went up in flames.</p><p>Relena kissed back, hands finding purchase in the bunches of his shirt. She couldn’t even remember what color it was. She was kissing him back, and relief was pumping through her; blessed, sweet relief that did nothing to cool her. <em>Yes</em>. Heero was pressing her to himself in the middle of her apartment, and she felt him, all along her body. She remembered the first time she’d seen it, lying on the floor of her bedroom, one of his feet tucked under her bed. That hadn’t been vanity then.</p><p>She breathed into the kiss, pushing back. Pushing <em>back.</em> Her fingers gripped harder into the fabric of his shirt, and then she arched her back, so she could <em>rip it off</em>. Their mouths broke apart, so he could help her.</p><p>She wanted to stare at him, then. They were looking at each other, panting, lips wet, eyes glowing. She wanted the luxury of just looking at him, knowing she could. But it could wait. It would wait. Relena put her hand on his bare skin, and, let her fingers and palm stutter against its surface. Heero’s head dropped so he could watch her touch.</p><p>He hissed a breath, and Relena’s hand moved up his neck. She could barely process what was happening, how it had come so quickly to this. They hadn’t gone on a date, even. She wasn’t totally sure of his last name. But maybe it was just there already: the wanting, the craving, the matching of selves. Relena slid her fingers against his skin, spreading over his jaw. He hadn’t shaved, and his skin was rough, like fine-grade sandpaper.</p><p>Heero kissed her again.</p><p>And then he took her to the bedroom.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Sex was, and was not, a complicated thing. It had been done since the beginning of time. Since the beginning of the human race.</p><p>It shouldn’t surprise her – it <em>didn’t surprise her</em> – that Heero knew what he was doing. It was at times both incredibly exciting, and incredibly off-putting, the idea that she was in no ways the first.</p><p>But by god. He <em>knew what he was doing</em>.</p><p>When her interest lagged, when thoughts got the better of her, he brought her back. He was generous, cautious, he…he was the one to get the condom, for crying out loud.</p><p>She nearly tore him apart when he got back.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>They fell asleep in her bed, for minutes, maybe. Maybe a few hours.</p><p>And Relena opened her eyes, the lamp by the bed still on, and found him on the other pillow, eyes closed.</p><p>It occurred to her, that it was not the first time she’d seen him asleep. She smiled.</p><p>Relena took the advantage, staring at the fan of his dark eyelashes against his cheeks, and the full, sensual shape of his lips. Memories flooded of what he’d been <em>doing with those lips</em>, feeding a pool of warmth between her thighs.</p><p>She shouldn’t.</p><p>Maybe he couldn’t.</p><p>Maybe he was tired.</p><p>Maybe they should both get some sleep. </p><p>But.</p><p>She took a breath, and.</p><p>Relena moved from under the blanket, her shoulders undulating as she traveled the foot of space between them. She kissed the far end of his collar bone, heard the intake of breath as he woke. Some part of her wanted to smile. Relena kissed his skin again instead, her gaze darting down, towards the legs and hips hidden by the blanket. What time was it? She kissed a third time, pushing with her body, so Heero turned on to his back. She kicked out of the blankets, putting her leg over him, still completely naked, still completely nonplussed.</p><p>This was what she’d been wanting to do for so long, with the duvet sliding down his torso, with a bit of her own help. Her gaze ate him hungrily, greedily, each individual muscle of his stomach and chest. Then his neck, and his arms. She’d seen handsome men before. She’d been with handsome men before. But this. There was just something about <em>this</em>— </p><p>He let her look at him, then…let her touch him; hands tentative at first, like probing the surface of a lake. His skin was warm, smooth.</p><p>She curled her body towards him, finding his lips with her own. Her mouth was familiar with his now, knew what it meant when he pressed, knew the feel of his tongue on her lips. She opened on an inhale, deepening the kiss easily, readily, Heero’s hands on her back, gripping her in place. The blanket was still between them, its overwashed linen harsh against her skin. She wanted it off. She wanted it off, again.</p><p>She mewed, frustrated, turned on, wanting more, when she tried to shift her weight, when Heero’s hands held her firmly in place. She leaned back an inch, breaking their kiss with some needy sound as she lifted her hips, unable to stand the sensation. Heero’s open-mouthed breathing fanned her lips, her chin, as his one arm curved around her, ran a quick hand through her opening.</p><p>She hissed through clenched teeth, eyes closed.</p><p>Heero touched her again.</p><p>The skin was sensitive, so sensitive, everything between her hips already full with blood and heat.</p><p>Heero dipped a finger inside of her, and her mouth opened on a puff of breath. <em>Yes.</em></p><p>He pulled his hand away, and she could hear him lick his lips. Her heart rate spiked.</p><p>His thumb found her clit then, using the moisture of her to ease the friction.</p><p>Relena groaned through gently parted lips. <em>Yes</em>.</p><p>One of his long fingers broke from the others to push inside of her again. His free hand gripped her ass. </p><p>She got another rush of heat, feeling his hand on her, inside her, the gentle, nearly lazy stroking of her clit. Relena bit her lower lip, awash with pure sensation. <em>Yes. </em>Her eyes were still closed. The thinking of it was what was doing her in. She started to move her hips, a bit, meeting the rolling of his hands and fingers and thumb. Heero released an audible breath, and heat flooded again. She might – she could – she was going to anyway.</p><p>Heero pushed her back, an unexpected move of coordinated effort. He slipped from out of the blankets just as she fell on top of them, and before she’d even stopped to think, before she’d even thought to question his actions or open her eyes, his lips were on her, on the gentle skin just at her hip line.</p><p>Relena sucked in a breath. The heat between her legs curled in on itself. Heero kissed farther, not taking long, not wanting her to suffer, as his mouth found where his hands had been.</p><p>Relena mewed again, her hands in the blanket as she twisted her torso. Not her hips, though. She wouldn’t dare move her hips, as Heero’s tongue, and his lips, and his whole mouth worked her over. Her breaths turned to pants, then. Another gush of heat. His mouth wouldn’t stop. His tongue wouldn’t stop, some rhythm to it which was cresting the wave. She touched his hair, brushing her fingers through the strands.</p><p>And she came again.</p><p>Her body curved away, the pulses of pleasure washing through her body. It filled all the same crevices as he’d coaxed through the first time, some minutes or hours or days ago.</p><p>The sounds were leaving her throat, some moaning string of syllables. She turned on her side, coiling her arms into her chest, her core throbbing in expending waves. She still couldn’t bring herself to open her eyes. Certainly not <em>now</em>, not when, just the sense of him, the smell of him, was filling her up. Oh god.</p><p>She felt him, heard him, as he slid behind her back, his arms covering her own, his legs tucking beneath her thighs, knees to knees. She felt his erection beneath the curve of her ass, and the breath left her, again. The golden warmth of release pulsed under her skin.</p><p>She knew, somehow, instinctively, that he wouldn’t press for more. That they could easily fall asleep like this, on top of her duvet. Pressed together like they were, there was plenty of heat.</p><p>But something – <em>curiosity, maybe. Wanton, pathetic, curiosity</em> – had her reaching back, after awhile. Heero hadn’t moved after finding his resting position, pressing only gentle, mild kisses on her skin and her hair. He hadn’t moved and when she did, when her hand went to his hip, behind her own, when it started moving down the side of it, she heard the gentle groan. Already spent, the warmth fanned within her.</p><p>She reached between their bodies and found the length of him, a wave of sensation waking up the follicles on her legs.</p><p>“Yes?” she breathed, opening her eyes.</p><p>Heero pressed his face into her shoulder, the skin of her neck. “Yes,” he ground out, maybe unwilling to move. Relena’s cheek hitched, the beginnings of a smile. She touched him more, her familiarity growing, having to be <em>oh, so, gentle</em>, without anything to slicken her hand over his hypersensitive skin. It was more exploratory, really, than stimulating. He didn’t seem to mind. The condoms were already by the bed, now. She reached for one, passed it over, bit her lower lip again as she heard Heero rip it open, roll it on. She felt her chest rising and falling with anticipation.</p><p>The press of him, against her, had her eyes closing again. He felt so <em>big</em>, there, and her stomach warmed as he pressed farther, and farther inside of her. The way their bodies were hooked together like this, it just, he slid all the way in, and there was a beat of just honest to god <em>feeling</em>. She was already sore inside, maybe. Sore but – but everything felt...<em>good</em>. Great. Wonderful. Ugh. She turned her head towards the mattress, face pinched on the delicious feeling of it all.</p><p>“Okay?” Heero whispered, against just the shell of her ear. She nodded, too quick, too eager. Heero exhaled.</p><p>He pulled back, after another moment, and her mouth filled with saliva. Oh god it felt good. Heero set a gentle pace, at first. He knew just as well as she did how long it had been since they’d done this, how it could be. She felt warmth all around him, inside of her, the beginnings of another rush of pleasure. It was – it shouldn’t be happening.</p><p>It just felt so good<em>. </em>Heero pressed his chest against her back, pulling her closer, until every inch was touching, was pressed together hard and fast. She moaned anew at the feeling of closeness. His rhythm increased.</p><p>Heero’s hand cupped her breast then, a greedy, selfish hold as he pressed his mouth against her shoulder. He rolled the flesh in his hand, and Relena stretched her neck, bowing against pressure, relishing in the angle of their bodies. The tempo of his hips increased again. She felt the stirrings of pleasure, again. <em>Again.</em> No, this, she wouldn’t let, she wouldn’t put her body through that again. It felt good. It felt <em>so good. </em>That was enough. Her breath was coming in puffs, and she reached back, sliding her hand into his hair. He groaned again. Heero liked that, then. She gripped the roots, a forgiving pressure, willing to release it if it was too much.</p><p>It wasn’t.</p><p>Heero’s hand went to the outside of her hip, holding her so he could deepen the strokes, a heavy, heady pulse inside of her. Her mouth opened, her eyes opened. Oh this felt <em>good.</em> She could let him do this. This he could – she’d have more of this, later.</p><p>“I’m – “ he said, and he stopped, all at once. She was already groaning, but she stopped herself, nodding emphatically.</p><p><em>Don’t stop</em>.  “Yeah.”</p><p>Heero’s tumbled breath fell on her skin. Everything flushed with pleasure.</p><p>“Okay,” he said, and Heero’s hips started to move again. Slow, so slow, and increasing quick, not stopping until, not stopping until he was where he was before. Relena swallowed, still holding his hair. His lips parted on her skin, his breath coming fast, his hips faster, harder, deeper, until he was coming, and his mouth touched against her again.</p><p>It just. It felt so <em>good. </em>Her legs and arms were alight with some static form of energy, some wonderful sensation under her skin. Her core was throbbing. She could take even <em>more</em>, she realized. It could wait, it would have to wait, she’d been selfish enough already, but. She’d never before had such a clear and utter <em>want</em> of someone. </p><p>Heero was the first to move.</p><p>Part of it was purely practical; it was uncomfortable, after awhile, and someone had to get rid of the tiny bag of semen. He pulled out, stood, disappeared into the next room. She was feeling too warm and pleasant to think about it, much.</p><p>Too full to think about much of anything, really, until Heero returned to her room.</p><p>He paused too long in the doorway, and it made her turn around.</p><p>He was looking at his clothes, scattered on the floor, and she could read his thoughts too well. </p><p>Was it time to go? Did he want to go? ...Did…did <em>she </em>want him to go?</p><p>A coldness gripped her stomach, then. Maybe he should…maybe he should, go.</p><p>Heero rubbed his cheek. He frowned at his clothes, then turned, and sat down on her bed with a sigh.</p><p>Relena bit her lower lip. She didn’t quite know what to say.</p><p>Heero bowed forward, digging his hand into his hair, elbow propped on his knee. He dropped his hand, after a beat.</p><p>“I uh,” he said, wetting his lips. “I don’t want to leave.”</p><p>Relena…she stopped thinking, for a moment.</p><p>“You,” she tried to say, slipping under some of the covers. It was getting cold. “You don’t?”</p><p>He looked at her from the corner of his eye.</p><p>“No.”</p><p>Relena looked away, trying to process the words. What did that… Did he always sleep over with his partners? Hm. No, Catherine had said she’d caught him in the halls in the middle of the night. Well, hm. That was one person, not really a general rule. She pressed her lips together, about to say <em>you don’t <strong>have</strong> to (want to stay)</em>, but, she stopped herself.</p><p>He was offering to stay. And that was… Hm.</p><p>“Well,” she said, considering. “You could…you could stay.”</p><p>Heero didn’t move for a moment. His whole naked body held still, sitting on the edge of her bed, before he started toeing the jeans in a messy heap on the floor.</p><p>Why did she feel so…</p><p>“It’s fine, I can go,” he said, and he shifted his weight to stand. Relena’s hand darted out.</p><p>“No,” she said. <em>God</em>, she had just not thought this through yet. “Just, give me a minute to think.”</p><p>He tilted his face in her direction.</p><p>Relena frowned. Did she want him to stay? </p><p><em>Yes,</em> was the immediate reply, the instinctive reply, the one that spoke from the experience of curled toes and washboard abs and beautiful hair. The one that wanted this to be more than it probably could be.</p><p>But it was just, what if this was his routine? What if she was just like all the others?</p><p>…She wanted to ask, then. Selfishly she wanted to ask, what it was like, with everyone else. Was it always this good? <em>Probably.</em> She couldn’t bring herself to, knew if it was her being asked, well. Yeah, she couldn’t ask. It didn’t mean, though, that she didn’t…want to.</p><p>This is what she’d talked about with Lucrezia. This is what she’d had to prepare herself for. Liking him more than he could possibly like her. Wanting more than he was willing to give.</p><p>Relena wet her lips. “I want you to stay,” she said, finally, and Heero stared at her. Stared and stared. It might have been impolite, his gaze, but he was clearly gauging her honesty. “Seriously Heero,” she said, and now she tried to smile, and found it wasn’t too hard to do. “You’ve given me two orgasms already. The least I could do is offer you my other pillow.”</p><p>Heero puffed a laugh. He looked away, then, staring for a beat at his clothes, before shaking his head. A beat for thinking, and then, he grinned, and looked back at her.</p><p>And with a flash of movement, he was on her, his arm roping around her middle, tugging her with him to the bed. He was staying. He was <em>staying.</em> They fit like spoons again, Relena grabbing to move the blanket over both of them. Heero didn’t seem to want to let her go, even as she pulled her hair out of the way, finding some comfortable position for sleeping. </p><p>Heero turned off the light. </p><p>There was a warmth, fluttering in her belly, that she didn’t quite know what to do with. And it only amplified further, when Heero chuckled against her ear.</p><p>“Two, huh?” he asked, and Relena’s face warmed. He pulled her tighter against himself. And then his voice dropped, to a teasing, husky sort of tone.</p><p>“I can do better.”</p><p>Relena didn’t doubt it, for a single second.</p><p>
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</p><p>They woke up later, early for a Monday morning, and after Heero proved himself <em>correct</em> they got coffee and breakfast sandwiches from a place a few blocks away. Relena felt like she was gloating the whole walk to and from, Heero holding her close to his side as they used sidewalks and crosswalks. She didn’t want to let him go, somehow.</p><p>They showered together, which was risky but ultimately tame, and Heero helped make sure she wore a right and a left shoe to work. They made plans to meet up again when she got home, and the kiss he gave her before she had to run and get the bus (she was going to be late she was going to be late oh holy cow was she going to be late) made her want to quit her job immediately.</p><p>But she got on the bus, running to catch it half a block ahead, getting lucky when Howard let her on with a laugh. </p><p>“Busy morning?” he teased, and she had to check herself for hickeys.</p><p>She smiled benignly the whole ride, staring out the windows at the nearly barren trees, reminiscing. </p><p>And it occurred to her, suddenly, that when it came to Heero and her biggest pet peeves it was her who’d been guilty of all of them. Heero had been the one to toe her unspoken line. Huh.</p><p>She nearly took out her phone then, nearly took it out to text him. A grin splashed across her face. Oh goodness. She was in trouble.</p><p>But it was honestly the best kind.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>The end.</strong>
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  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Comments and kudos are love. Thank you so much for reading 💕</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. come on home and (epilogue)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>some saccharin fluff just because it's a good day</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>A few months later…</b>
</p><p> </p><p>Relena awoke on the third day of March with a quick inhale.</p><p>It was...it was <em> warm</em>.</p><p>Oh god was it warm.</p><p>Her eyes already open, she explored everything else with her other senses, easily identifying the culprit. Her lips stretched into a smile.</p><p>Now, to decide how to wake him.</p><p>She elected on the route most likely to get her to work on time, twisting in Heero’s arms. She couldn’t pretend that they did this every night, fell asleep like two spoons in a drawer, but, this morning, Heero was all over her. </p><p>He huffed and hermed a bit as she moved, trying to be gentle. He was taking up most of her pillow, though. She felt it was only fair. </p><p>Relena tucked her head under his chin, her hand sliding around his naked torso. She shifted under the leg he’d thrown over her thighs. </p><p>“Heero,” she whispered, after a moment.</p><p>He grunted.</p><p>Relena smiled.</p><p>“The radiator’s busted.”</p><p>Heero’s head lifted off her pillow then, and she could see him squint blearily in its direction.</p><p>“No it’s not.”</p><p>Relena bit her lower lip so she wouldn’t laugh. “It is. Feel how hot it is in here?” It <em> was</em>, hotter in here. The seasons were changing again. It was getting time, really, to adjust the central thermostat. </p><p>She could practically <em> hear </em> Heero’s grin in kind. “Maybe you should call your super.”</p><p>Relena’s shoulders were honest to god shaking, then. “I would, but. I have it on good authority he’s hard to reach on Monday mornings. Very grouchy. Likes to sleep in.”</p><p>“Likes to do other things, too,” he said, his hand running over her back. She ignored the rush of heat. <em> Work on time</em>. Relena put her hand on top of his, when it reached the outside of her hip, and Heero sighed as he stopped his pursuit. He nuzzled his nose into her hair instead. “‘M not <em> grouchy</em>.”</p><p>A different kind of warmth spread, then. Pure affection. She kissed him quick on the lips. “I have work,” she explained, and she slid out of his arms and out of the bed, Heero’s hand gripping weakly until she was a step away.</p><p>She walked through the living room and into the kitchen, setting up the coffee pot, doubling the grinds. Some mornings they were ships passing in the whatever, and Heero started the coffee just for her, as one went to bed and one went into the world. She liked these mornings, though. The ones where they got to wake up together.</p><p>Satisfied that it would start percolating, Relena walked back through the rooms towards the bathroom, ignoring the small stacks of books covering most surfaces. Heero kept bringing them over and forgetting them, which really didn’t bother her at all. Every few weeks she shlepped an armful back to the basement and left it at that. In fact, more and more things were getting shlepped down there. His apartment was good for storing her seasonal clothes, for example, so she could make room for his rather static wardrobe of shirts and jeans. He also happened to have a better vacuum cleaner than her. Or rather, he used to, because she would probably claim that and only that in the event of a break-up.</p><p>Navigating a relationship with Heero had been...interesting. Challenging. Fun? Oh god that wasn’t the word, maybe. A week in and he admitted that despite her fervent insistence, he wasn’t really interested in sleeping with anyone else, which was almost funny at the time, because he’d literally spent every night in her bed.</p><p>At first under the most pathetic guises: I heard there were rats, I should probably check. Your CO2 monitor needs to be replaced this could take awhile. Gotta change the light bulb in your oven we’re doing a service.</p><p>It was cute, really. They gave up on excuses pretty quickly, and she made room for the type of granola he liked.</p><p>Which wasn’t to say that it had been entirely a smooth transition. Relena realized she had a hard time believing he would just switch on monogamy for her, just like that, despite his exasperated assertions. There had been a few fights in the beginning and whenever she was feeling sensitive, especially as 1E really didn’t seem to feel like giving up, and they had to keep running into Wufei.</p><p>It was a bit better after he moved.</p><p>Catherine resumed her old dating habits and got a new running partner, 4C got a new boyfriend across town and was out of the building half the week. And...Relena somewhat enjoyed, really, the pouty discomfort of the barista, whenever she got a seasonal latte.</p><p>Because that was that, really. She had a boyfriend. He was smoking hot. Things were pretty good.</p><p>Relena hung up her pajamas and got into the shower, not at all surprised that she heard Heero’s footsteps, just a few minutes in.</p><p>He pulled back the shower curtain and shuddered, a little, stepping inside and wrapping himself quickly around her.</p><p>“It’s cold,” he mumbled, and she smiled. It wasn’t that cold.</p><p>They stood for a minute like that, under the water. </p><p>“You ready?” he asked her, finally warm enough maybe, breaking away to get the soap. </p><p>She’d never tell him, but she <em> loved </em> watching him lather. </p><p>Relena nodded, trying not to be too obvious as she watched him. She fought off a grin. Maybe she <em> could </em> be late for work? But, no, she had a big presentation today.</p><p>“Yeah,” Relena sighed, answering his question, and she turned around to get her shampoo.</p><p>The suds were just running into her eyes, when she felt Heero’s hands on her middle. She paused.</p><p>“You know what’s great for nerves,” he offered, and a thrill curled low in her belly.</p><p>“Clean hair?” she said, lips dry against her teeth. She heard Heero’s soft chuckle, as his soapy hands traveled <em> up</em>. Late for work. Damn him. </p><p>His lips found her own, meeting in just a light, chaste kiss, just as his hands found the swells of her breasts, his thumbs her already firmer nipples. <em> Damn him</em>.</p><p>“I’m going to be late,” she murmured, smiling against his mouth, and Heero’s hands moved to cup her rear so he could pull her to him.</p><p>“I accept that as a challenge,” he mumbled, and then he kissed her quite thoroughly, again.</p><p>Well. She was definitely going to miss the first bus. But there were plenty of worse things.</p>
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